by Jess Moriarty
How can I please you mother,
Teacher, brother, peer reviewer, boyfriend,
Partner, husband, lover, friend from school, friend from gym,
Nurse at smear test, next of kin,
Midwife, surgeon, breast feeding trainer,
Waxer, taxer, therapist, student, colleague, nemesis,
Bank manager, life insurer, younger sis.
Builder, baker, my own maker, new born, new one, stepson,
Nan?
How can I bring your spring, your summer,
Urge you from the winter mother,
How can I always be your sunrise when
The night in me wants her say?
How can I please you with my 6 weeks too early, too late to have a baby,
Too tall in the school photo, too nice to get promoted, too sarcastic in meetings,
Too much, too too much,
Too many crisps, too many cigarettes, too many drinks, too many pills – green and yellow, smiley faces and
Red like pomegranate seeds.
Too much homework, too many friends, too often on the phone,
Too fucking smart, too gay, definitely too fat to get fucked.
Too much staying in then too much going out,
Too many clothes, too much flesh, too obvious, too little,
Too many boys, too much choice, too much no choice at all.
Too feminist, too much asking for it, too high, too hard when I fell.
All these wanting faces, wanting me to be more, do more, give more.
Never quite enough.
When Hades came, they did not drag me off the way father had it said,
My story and my mother’s – always his, never ours,
Him the hero and us bit parts in his one-sided play.
When Hades came,
I was tired. In the garden planting seeds to please my mother,
They offered me their hand, their kingdom and said:
Please yourself.
Myself?
And I dared wonder how that might look and feel and smell and sound and taste
And I wanted to try it on, twirl around and say:
It fits just right.
In the Underworld, at first, I did not know
What I then was,
My hands and legs would flit and flinch,
A Frankenstein of what I might be.
A queen, I thought, should help
The souls who seek the sun but no,
Their journeys are their own and then
I tried to make my marriage work
But Hades only laughed when I did the
Things I’d learnt to keep the peace.
Please yourself.
They said again and I
Gave in.
And now I know myself, my joy
Is to live life for me and not a
Boy or Zeus who would not share
The light and made my mother
Frozen, white. Now when I return
To her embrace, her warmth and love
Her tender face, she knows that while it
Brings her woe, back to my queendom I will go.
In summer, I am at her side
But in my realm, I now reside
My new found bliss? Not on my knees
But on my feet with me to please.
Not too much but just enough,
A woman I have come to love.