Day 11 ... NaPoWriMo / Poem-a-Day 2019

Maureen Thorson’s NaPoWriMo prompt: “Today, . . . we’d like to challenge you to write a poem of origin. Where are you from? Not just geographically, but emotionally, physically, spiritually? Maybe you are from Vikings and the sea and diet coke and angry gulls in parking lots. Maybe you are from gentle hills and angry mothers and dust disappearing down an unpaved road. And having come from there, where are you now?” Robert Lee Brewer’s Poem-a-Day prompt: “For today’s prompt, write a dedication poem. This is a poem dedicated to a person, an animal, or an organization. Or hey, objects work too–like a poem to a rock or paper bag. Put the dedication in the title or in a line under the title (‘for Mother’ or ‘to the heart-shaped rock between the creek and the tulips’). I dedicate today’s prompt to all of you!” Many thanks to Robert for a very generous shout-out in today's poem-a-day challenge post about my book The Coolest Month, which is made up of April poems just like the one below, but over the last seven years. Robert links to Final Thursday Press, where you can find information on how to order the book. You can also order it from Amazon. Merging the two prompts, I'm glad of the opportunity to write about my mother. During the Q&A at the book launch for The Coolest Month two nights ago, in response to a question on writing about family, I mentioned that I had written a lot about my father, resulting in my book Fighting Kite, and that I hoped to do a similar project in my mom's memory. Well, here we have a door opening for me to write one of those poems! Today, I offer a partially slant-rhymed Shakespearean sonnet a closing Alexandrine couplet. Definitely a "dedication poem," especially given the title, but the theme of origin is in there perhaps more circumstantially. For my Mother            —Candida Gotera (1914-1976) She was the voice I heard through the earliest wall. She was the hand on my forehead when I was sick. When I would go out with high school friends, she’d call to me from across the street, saying “Come back,” just to tell me, “Be careful.” She was the lap I sat on when I was four, the comfy chair whose arms would cradle you. Her hair, so black when I was young, became feathered with silver streaks just like my own hair now. When cancer metastasized through her bones, she was never weak, always a smile despite her pain. Her answer to trouble was always hang on, weather the bleak moments. Alhough Mama’s been gone 43 years, she lives on in me: everything of mine was hers. —Draft by Vince Gotera    [Do not copy or quote . . . thanks.] In this photo, Mama is second from the left (next to my ex-wife Ivania), Papa is in the middle holding my son Marty, and I am on the right. (Click on the photo to see it larger.) I chose this picture today because one can see how much I looked like my mom at the time. This was probably in 1973, about three years before Mama passed away from cancer. I was in the service at the time — US Army — and I'm guessing early 1973 because Marty was born in June 1972 and I was away at Army training from shortly after his birth until November of that year, at which time we moved into the apartment where this snapshot was taken. I first thought maybe this was taken at Christmas when my parents would have visited, but my haircut was probably a bit long here for someone who had just come back a month before from Army training. Since my dad is in a suit, I'm thinking this might have been Easter 1973. Friends, won’t you comment, please? Love to know what you’re thinking. To comment, look for a red line below that starts Posted by, then click once on the word comments in that line. If you don’t find the word “comments” in that line, then look for a blue link below that says Post a comment and click it once. Thanks! Ingat, everyone.  ヅ

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