A Mom’s Lament

He plays the cello suite

in a wrong tuning

The lowest string not dropped,

 each bass note

a step too high - rude barging 

into an otherwise soothing song

It is a musical joke.

He plays with his eyes closed

shifting inexorably 

towards the horizontal

from which he leveraged himself, 

with great groanings

demagnetized himself, most laboriously, 

from the computer screen

after playing, lying down with his travel guitar, 

a lament about having to rise.

He digresses to trim his fingernails

But I shall have music.  Eventual music.

It is my hope.  It would be a sweet fruit 

of weary repetitious prodding.

I am here to encourage him

to curl into his space among the animals

on the bed.  To occupy it

so it won’t pull him so quickly back.

How is it that this job belongs to me?

Or have I brought it down on my own head?

by too high expectations or by being too low key?

this daily nagging (begging) I have come to dread?

©Wendy Mulhern
April 5, 2011