What Your Mother Never Told You

Part II

'Wake up, wake up.'
Eyelids open sleepily,
my mother stands by my single bed
in a white cotton nightgown.
Dark hair loose and messy,
feet bare on the wooden floor,
moonlight casts indigo shadows
under puffy, bloodshot eyes.

Marjorie, come with me.
She walks out of my room like a sleepwalker,
her feet floating above the ground.

I follow footprints to the beach,
cold July air wraps around my bones;
as waves crash on the rocky shore.
She wades into inky indigo,
saltwater splashes the ends of her nightgown,
pink lips turn lavender,
her dark eyes search
the horizon.

She takes one slow,
deep
breath
and dives
into endless blue.

I clutch my doll close to my chest,
count sixty Mississippi's.
She emerges from the waves
like a washed-up mermaid
who can't survive on land.

I was only ten;
I believed she just went for a midnight swim
in winter.