Danielle McMahon
ON THE PROBABILITY OF MY MOTHER BEING RELEASED FROM PRISON
Maybe it will be spring and I’ll be waiting in my best
Sunday dress with knocking knees, holding
a pink carnation and a Hallmark
for the occasion. Maybe
you will stumble over the curb
in your courtroom heels and ask
me for cash to pay the jitney
driver before you say hello. Maybe
we’ll have coffee and cheesedogs
on the seedy side of town and I’ll pull threads
of forgiveness from my fingertips and clasp your clammy hands
in my own. Maybe, at that moment, a pearl will divine itself
in our palms and we will finally be understood.
Maybe, then, we can howl together
the way that women do. Maybe your moth-eaten blouse
will droop from your shoulders because you are so,
so sorry. Maybe not. Maybe we will say nothing
at all and I’ll watch your eyes the way I watch
my own in the mirror and I’ll crush
one cigarette out after another in the same patch
of ashtray until the table is black and blue. Maybe
we’ll see the reflection of ourselves
out on the sidewalk. You will be the mother
carrying a jug of milk in capable arms and I
will be the child
chasing redfooted pigeons.