She is my greatest teacher, as is death,
and with each visit with her I am more and more humbled and deeply so grateful
for the mother/daughter connection that we share.
My mother taught me at
a very young age to honor ourselves, and also our connection to Mother Moon.
She is my Mother Moon. "No matter
where we are, we will always share the same moon," she once told me when
we were missing one another.
I know in years to come, when my Mom no longer
possesses earthly form, that Mother Moon will continue to connect me to her.
And though I hope that day is many, many, moons from now, this poem is in honor
of her and our connection to Mother Moon.
Mother Moon
She
sat sipping air
through
the tube in her nose
that
stretches across
the
length of her house.
She
pushed her walker,
with
tennis balls
attached
to its feet
making
it easier
for
her to slide
over
multiple surfaces.
Some
see her as frail,
nearing
her end,
but
within her mind, heart, and spirit,
lies
the history
of
a strong woman,
one woman’s
journey
with
feeding seven hungry mouths
without
a man to help her.
The
history of her care,
how
she juggled
three
jobs, a house,
colds,
chicken pox,
tonsil
surgeries,
broken
arms, limbs, stiches,
hormonal
changes,
all
that comes with raising
seven
children on one’s own
can
be seen
in
her prematurely aged 72 years.
She,
once Goddess, now Crone,
pushes
her walker to the fridge
for
cranberry juice
then
shuffles back
to
her seat
at
the end of the table
across
from where her father once sat.
She's
both man and woman,
bread-winner,
and
child bearer,
disciplinarian
and
spirit teacher.
She
taught her girls
to
honor the moon,
the
moon within,
and
the moon
she
had them sit beneath with her
on
clear Kentucky summer nights.
She
taught her children well.
How
to cleanse their third eyes
simply
by observing the moon
crossing
the sky.
She’s
seen nearly 870 Full Moons,
with
each one cleansing more deeply
the
eye she taught her daughters
to
view the world with,
the
same eye she saw
each
of her children with,
a
mother’s third eye.
Even
now,
from
behind her walker,
with
oxygen attached,
she
looks at her children
with
the moon’s eye,
at
every fault, mistake,
and
flaw,
with
compassionate vision,
seeing
only spirit
beneath,
and, within us all.
and, within us all.
~
Krista Katrovas (E-RYT) has dedicated herself to the practice, study and teaching of yoga since discovering it in 1999 after dancing rigorously as a dance major in college. Krista has had scores of articles on Yoga, Wellness, and Spirituality published in nationally regulated magazines. She has a regular column at Elephant Journal here. She has taught Yoga in Prague every July since 2009 and has been sought to teach in Kuwait, Canada, Virginia, California, Kentucky, and Florida. She calls Kalamazoo, Michigan home, where she teaches Yoga, Meditation, offers Spiritual guidance, and practices Shamanism. She has cats, though also loves dogs, all animals. Her power animal is the Snowy Owl. Visit her yoga website here.
~If you are interested in seeing your poetry appear in this blog, or submitting a poem by a woman that has inspired you, please click here for submission guidelines. I greatly look forward to hearing from you!~
Gorgeous poem. Very moving. Makes me think of my mom in honor of this New Moon rising tonight.
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