Ruined Rites of Passage

He dreamed about his mother last night

and in the daylight he thought about

rites of passage.

For high school graduation, his sister

reserved a table at a nice place and

his mother said

sorry but your dad died and I don’t

have any money for a present. For a

play in college,

his sister brought his mother and

her critique was about as harsh as

the reviewer who

wrote nothing about his part. When he

graduated his sister bought him a class

ring and his

mother just looked at it covetously.

Four years later when he graduated

from divinity school,

his mother told him that the president

had told her that her son

had a long

way to go, when in reality,

the president said he would go

a long way.

When he got his doctorate, his

mother told him not to let it go

to his head.

It didn’t go to his head, but his

heart ached and twenty-seven

years later and

long after his mother had died

at a ripe old age alone and

not very popular

he still had thoughts of that

ninety-five pound, ninety-three

year old woman

who lives on way beyond her

years in some nightly rituals

called bad dreams.