Somethings are inevitable. This is a story of a mother letting go. |
Sins of His Mother, Sins of My Father I'm thirty years old, feeling a midlife crisis; caught up in something bigger than me, a decision--my decision--I'm surely paying for. Son in my hands-- clenched, I should say, making him pay for the sins of his mother, although his mother won't allow him to know. His father long-dead. His future still a mystery. I look at him and suddenly remember the fists of a man I called my father. And now I wear his mask. Now I'm him at forty, staring down at me at twelve, same age as my son but now detached. Sweat on my face, wet against the mask; not completely sure whether this heaviness of my face is my shame or that of another man's. Clenching her throat, but I know I'll let go. Although I know I'm not myself anymore, his thoughts are mine, but mine are those of a spectator. My father will die soon, and so will his grasp at the end of a realization of what was done and of a barrel, safety to the blast. Now I see my son. Eyes of my own find my hold on him an act of someone else, my hands numb, my grip cold. Sluggish -tocking of a clock. It's stillness, then it's not. I drop my hands and look at the floor. My little boy runs to hug me. I hold him close to my chest; heart beats tears out of my eyes, down my face, tears of my father, my conscience his mask. |