motherly affect(at)ion

Amelia Nason

i don’t know how to handle my mother’s love
there’s so much of it spilling sticking slopping
all over me honey catching flies

lots of vinegar in the world.

it’s magenta staining her hands
as she dyes my hair over the laundry room sink
& plays a podcast about hating ayn rand

manages not to hate me.

she puts applesauce in the pancakes i’m afraid to eat
we sit in our aseptic kitchen and pretend
i’d have breakfast even if she wasn’t there

keeps me alive against the (1:5) odds.

fifth trip to palo alto another hotel room with
a defunct coffee machine & too much light
seeping under the blinds are you awake?

well, now i am.

it can’t be easy paying a couple thousand dollars
to watch your kid lose a tournament again
but she never asks for better only my best

makes me want (to be) more.

we walk through the forest on sunday mornings
she has us stop to breathe in sun-splattered air
& tells me things i’ll need to know in ten years

gives advice on people i’ve never met.

she reads my stories when they’re just blood on paper
talking about the characters like real people
not figments of my imagination or maladaptive hobbies

knows what i’m getting at before i do.

she says that we’re each other’s people
i don’t know how to be enough for that
having a person is a lot of responsibility

---

amelia nason is a next generation indie award finalist, a scholastic award winner, and an alumna of the interlochen, fir acres, and new york times summer writing programs. she also edits for kalopsia literary journal. her work is featured in the ice lolly review, full mood magazine, hand picked poetry, lunar journal, diet water mag, and the origami review. her debut chapbook is forthcoming from bottlecap press. when she isn’t writing, amelia fences competitively. you can find her on twitter @amelia_emn.

---