She is content,
vaguely satisfied that her life has come full circle

She can now ask her soul to show it’s wrangled face
and the tiny tendrils of black guilt will seep away
Now that her daughter has forgiven her lack of presence
And her son understands her pain

She is done defining her inefficiencies
And has swept away her inadequacies
She is no longer compelled to mend her broken spirit
Nor does she continue to ask “why me?”

She is content,
whatever that may mean
She is aware of the brutal honesty that was her life
And knows that she is exactly what she seemed
She was aggressive,
inflexible
and moderately obscene

She is now mercifully absolved of her human condition
The circumstance that requires
Society’s pleasantries and delicate composition
She is at ease in her new found existence

Quietly celebrating freedom from perceived injustice

She is content now;
she has silently apologized for her absence
Her absence of etiquette,
absence of tact,
absence of self

She is content now;
she no longer has to justify her misgivings,
Defend her pride
or ponder her guilt

She is haunted.

She knows her days were incomplete
Her childhood may have kept her imprisoned

But she was also weak

She ignored the sacred covenant of life
And gave up on her dreams

She hurt her men and forgot her children
And harbored a vicious hostility

She lied and stood by
while others struggled to make sense of her falsities
She announced that the world owed her something
and took if it if not paid promptly
She took all of her hurt and pain
and advertised it for all to see
She held on so tight to her bitter life
that it allowed her to walk away from her seed

Oh, yes, she was slight and she was unscrupulous
but she was only what she thought she could be

I’m sure she struggled with her mistakes
Knowing that she gave less than she would take
She was needy and imperfect

But her love was not feigned

Her compassion has been shadowed by her unspoken heartbreak
Sadly, her selfishness dominated her soul’s
immeasurable ache
She didn’t know what to do
to leave a good impression in her wake

But she is better now

Better now that the smoke has cleared
And earth has reclaimed her body
Better because her daughter called
and decided to move on
Better because she was given a chance
to reconcile before she was gone.

She may not have been graceful or steady
But if one thing her part-time occurrence taught me
Is not to judge others shortcomings
because you never know what secrets lie underneath
 
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