Materna Naturis Poem by Jean Renwick

You’ve been working in the garden again.
I love the sweat-sweet smell of you.
I want to hold you,
bury my face on your breast and
relax in the folds of your body.
Your smile of exhaustion I cannot help but return,
my heart is filled.
I want to offer you flowers like a suitor,
to blush at your surprise.

I no longer live in what became my haven.
The new garden will hold no memories of you
and this house will become a home without your being here.
I say now, I would have done anything for you
but I didn’t, did I?
An adult talking in the illusion of hindsight.
My childlike innocence and youthful naivety
in the only area that truly matters –
acting on love.
I hope I didn’t let you down too badly.

I only twice ever saw you cry –
Once when your brother died and once over me.
I would have liked to comfort you:
a child treading the perimeter of grown-up emotions,
wanting to breach the sphere, perhaps
to one day reach the centre.

But we never touch another’s pain:
it is our own emotions we creep up upon,
a sudden awareness of how life has affected us.
You seemed to take it all in your stride –
a mother again after all those years, though
of course, one never really stops.

I couldn’t live the life you had. Then again, maybe
I am – having lost loved ones and been protective.
I protect myself now:
building walls I’m sure you wouldn’t approve of.
You were always my explanation, my virtues:
with your presence I could rest my case.
Finding them within myself has proved difficult.
Instead of your life, lessons and love inspiring me,
your death changed me forever.
Instead of growing to be the better parts of you,
I stopped participating in the world.

The anguish is real.
I can touch it, I can taste it.
I know I must be my own Source
but the Light, the letting go,
the fire of pure Being has yet to manifest for me;
I’m still learning how.
Maybe when I surface, bearing the jewels hard searched for,
uncovered from within,
your sacrifices will not have been in vain.