Expiring Roots

I was still scraping my knees

When my mother became sick

She couldn’t mend my childhood wounds

And needed nurturing more than I

But even so I envied my classmates

Their healthy, present parents

Devoted to their child's happiness above all else

And so I felt abandoned

But it was me who abandoned her

Preoccupied in my self-absorbed childish matters

Too busy looking on the outside

Where I was

To look on the inside

Where her cells were being exterminated

To continue draining her already depleting life

She was stronger than me