Ode to my Mother

I am my mother’s daughter. 
In this, I had no choice.

Don’t misunderstand me—
I write here about a woman I only half-know. 

Curiously, I can’t help but worry 
like the malade imaginaire that raised me.

Everything about me speaks back to her:
the beauty mark on my chin

the small nose that loves the smell of 
a clean home and warm bread 

the poetic tendency to beautify
that which is plain, to helplessly try and alter

the ugly into something it isn’t. In other words:
the art of crafting quotidian comedies and tragedies. 

Curiously, I can’t help but worry
about the problem of being my mother’s daughter.

© Sanita Fejzic