A

BROOKLYN TALE

by Dr. Mel Waldman  

An

oxygen tank stood majestically by her side,

like

a centurion or a Praetorian Guard watching over Mother.

I

left my little room, my sanctuary at the other end of our home,

overlooking

Ocean Avenue in Old Brooklyn

&

rushing slowly around the bend,

I

joined Father & my sister in Mother’s Room.

She

lay in bed.

We

gathered around her.

Smiling

weakly,

she

lost her breath,

lost

consciousness too,

her

gold eyes staring blankly at us from a faraway place.

But

she awakened,

resurrected

from the other side,

the

home of the dying & the dead,

&

magically, Mother rose suddenly, & cried out:

“I

thought I was dying!”

She

inhaled her last breath, dropped into non-being,

&

crossed the invisible boundary,

deep

into the nothingness humans often fear,

gone

forever,

Yesterday,

more than half-a-century ago,

a

timeless crack in eternity

captured

by a young man’s Mind’s Eye,

keeping

Mother alive, while saying goodbye.

I

often think of her & feel her love & mine for her

&

recall her absolute faith in me,

a

celestial force still feeding my sacred omphalos,

&

feasting gloriously on hope.

How

beautiful, unfathomable, & eerie this miracle of life!

How

sad, poignant, & transformational too!

I sometimes wonder

if

our fragile transience/mortality is a gift with hidden meaning,

if

only we find or create it.

Dr. Mel Waldman is a psychologist, poet, and writer whose stories have appeared in numerous magazines including HARDBOILED DETECTIVE, ESPIONAGE, THE SAINT, PULP METAL MAGAZINE, and AUDIENCE. His poems have been widely published in magazines and books including A NEW ULSTER, CLOCKWISE CAT, CRAB FAT LITERARY MAGAZINE, ESKIMO PIE, INDIANA VOICE JOURNAL, LIQUID IMAGINATION, THE BROOKLYN LITERARY REVIEW, BRICKPLIGHT, SKIVE MAGAZINE, ODDBALL MAGAZINE, PABLO LENNIS, POETRY PACIFIC, POETICA, RED FEZ, SQUAWK BACK, SWEET ANNIE & SWEET PEA REVIEW, THE JEWISH LITERARY JOURNAL, THE JEWISH PRESS, THE JERUSALEM POST, HOTMETAL PRESS, MAD SWIRL, HAGGARD & HALLOO, ASCENT ASPIRATIONS, YELLOW MAMA, THE BITCHIN’ KITSCH,  SOUL-LIT, TWO DROPS OF INK, and NAMASTE FIJI: THE INTERNATIONAL ANTHOLOGY OF POETRY.  A past winner of the literary GRADIVA AWARD in Psychoanalysis, he was nominated for a PUSHCART PRIZE in literature and is the author of 11 books.