Liebe Mutti (Dear Mother)
by Kika Dorsey

Yesterday I dreamed you were an ocean
full of dolphins, parrotfish, mussels and kelp.

I always knew you were vast, like the horizon
of deserts or the bellies of whales with Jonah,

swallowed by gods of the sea.
Once you sewed me a yellow dirndl.

Once you saved me from myself, lifted
me from your arms.

I want to shrink and fit into your ghost.
The waves of you I cannot bear, mountains too hard.

I watch romantic comedies, sleep in the basement,
wrap myself in florid paper, try to return

to you, where you concoct religions for me,
where the sacrificed has a voice, crashing on the shore.

I’m building sandcastles. A sand piper hops before me,
its sharp beak like the needle you used to

stitch that dress, the pelicans swooping, diving,
me with my makeshift self crumbling into water.

Once I dreamed we rode Lipizzaner stallions in Austria.
It was hailing outside, frozen water, the arena too small.

Once I knew you outside of a dream. I awaken,
press a conch shell against my ear. I hear you.

I breathe into your belly and lift sails into my wind.
You are beneath me, back rippling,

whale song and fin and my longing
to breathe underwater.



 

Return to: