"To My Mother", W.S. Merwin

Alas.

I thought this was appropriate.

Happy Mother's Day, all you mothers!

To My Mother

This very evening I reach
the age you were when you died
I look through the decades
down past the layers of cloud
you had been watching the dark
autumn sky over the garden
and had told me months before
with a grace note of surprise
that you were an old woman
you laughed at the thought of it
all my life you had told me
that dying did not frighten you
yours was the voice that told me
that I was not afraid
you stood up to go in
knowing it would rain that night

you had seen death many times
before I even knew you
I am watching the rain now
fall on another garden
your words are still in my head
it was the winter solstice
before I was thirty
that I was the age you were
on the day I was born
to slip between numbers
through the measureless days