Mother came to me in a dream, a bright, lively girl of sixteen.
She threw herself on my lap, confident of my love.

She said her mother had toiled in a world of sickness, guilt.
care-taking, and death.

And now, my mother wanted to live with me, someone who
loved her for who she was, and could be.

I worried whether to take her in, with children of my own,
so I asked if she’d like to go back to school.

She was delighted that I felt she could reach so high.
“You can do it, Mom,” I said.

(No, I didn’t say that. I wrote that here because I believe
in this dream.)

This sweet being, this gift, this presence who came to me,
was my own mother, tender and terrifying.

And so I held my mother on my knee, and told her
we could set ourselves free —

because now I’m the mother of the mother of me.