Mother to Child
One day I will search for you.
Find you where I lie 
in rose-colored fields 
full of life and warmth.
The day will lend on end 
to your soft hands and warm cheeks 
flush with playful intrigue.
There I will be looking back at you.
Smiles all around.
Face to face with scrunched-up 
noses.

Wife to Husband
Light will dance 
for us in candle, 
sun, and bulb.
Little lines 
in corners of our eyes
shine with experience 
of the years gone by.
My love, I draw you near, 
taste your lips, 
and squeeze you tight.
Alone with you, I wish to be, 
but alone is hard to come by.

~Cynthia Schaefer

Wrapping my arms around myself
the world opens to see me 
in a new way,
that life has drowned out my voice 
like water erodes land.
I long to hear the sound 
of my bayou that calls 
in gator bellows, pelican squawks, 
and flatboat motors. 
The estuaries reverberate 
in wakes that slap the shore. 
Gators slip under, 
awaiting the time to snatch a snack.  
Egrets dip their extended legs 
and beaks in the slimy mud 
to snatch an eel. 
Drifting along the currents,
expanding in the long years
that ask for more time 
as the marsh gives way to ocean.


Time given and taken away
in the borrowed sand of others,
pressed firm in oyster beds, 
hoping to form pearls.
Casting bait off
the warm shorelines 
of Bayou Lacombe 
that found its way 
into my heart. 
Still free to be 
the one I’ve always been 
and longing for the desires of tomorrow. 
I wander past the tall grass 
to unwrap my soul.
​
~Cynthia Schaefer

Not getting what you need 
hits the brick wall, 
shattering the hopes 
and expectations
like glass propelled by a rocket 
without a parachute.
I feel like a failure.  
Like I can’t do this anymore.
Somehow, my distorted view 
of who I should be
doesn’t match with who I am.


Boom! The rocket’s launched, 
glass bottle on top.


Why do I feel so lost?  
I can’t seem to get it together.
Then sadness and depression hits, 
when relief does not come.
Frustration with self to push down 
the walls of soldier on and I can do it all.
Why is the call for help so hard? 
Boundaries so hard to define, 
enforcement a control freak mess.
I hate myself sometimes. 


The rocket fuel burns out. 


I do my best to move onward, 
like a baby moving down the birth canal 
each step I take, I am sucked two steps back.
It is painful to feel.  
I need self-love and gratitude.
So drained of energy. 


Glass bottle plummets 
with its booster.


I need to find happy, 
after this spiral dive 
into sadness and anger.


Glass hits the ground,
surrendering its feeble parts 
in an unshakable quake.


Come out of this!  
You are stronger than you think.
You can get what you need. 


Why can’t I allow myself to feel? 


Lean into the pain 
like I encourage my children to do. 
Allow the shards to rest 
in their brokenness 
before the clean-up crew 
comes to take them away

I refuse to hold to a cultural norm 
that women do the housework. 


No, not anymore.


I’m done with judgments 
I can’t abide or control. 
It’s not mine to do anymore.


I’m tired of all you place on me, 
from the dishes to the childrearing.
I love my children, and why is it 
always me taking them 
when they are sick.
Doing all the doctor appointments. 
In charge of meal planning 
and the bathrooms.
Upholding a standard 
that I can’t keep up with, 
I spit in your face at the load 
you ask me to take.


I don’t want it anymore,.


No one should have to live up 
to the cleanliness level 
you show on TV.
Forget the health benefits. 
If no one helps, you can shove it!


Who said I could do it all? 


You had a role in this didn’t you.
Why did I think 
it was all mine to bear? 
When I went to work, 
the load, not fair.


Was I the weaker sex 
to take the blame 
that everyone says 
will put me to shame?
How did I not see past 
the gender bias to notice 
the divide of duties felt one-sided?
Why do you judge me and not him 
for the state that my house is in?


Who named me CEO 
without a golden parachute 
to catch me mid-air 
when the chaos of clutter 
and dirt enveloped my home? 
Too cheap to hire subordinates, 
all the duties on my shoulders 
so heavy I can barely move 
my neck side to side. 
The children I shuttled 
to daycare and back. 
The times I missed at work 
when my parents couldn’t 
risk their health 
to care for my sick babies. 
How is this right?


Then the guilt you put on me 
for being at work. 
My children spent 
more time at daycare.
When I quit my job 
to make it easier on me, 
I said goodbye to daycare, 
the women who took care of me. 
Then I really took it all, 
plus more guilt from you 
for not contributing.
Because nothing I did 
had money coming in. 


Society, why don’t you value me?


Where is the balance beam 
that allows me to walk effortlessly? 


All I do is fall.


Society, I realize these choices 
are all my own and somehow 
I’m not alone.
​

I toss and I turn.

His snores sound like bongs 
in my head. 
I thought I’d get use to them.
Most nights I drift off 
like a fire smoldering,
flickering out, 
smoke streaming 
puffing fast.
The last bit of thoughts 
burning in my mind
are swiftly snuffed 
as slumber takes me.

Not tonight. 

The day left me with logs stacked as high
as my shoulders, yet to burn.
Each one takes its time to light, 
crackle, and ignite the one above it. 
Worry from the words I said,
the actions I took, 
the movements quick.
Tears of self-hatred fall on regret.

Burning anger, spreads to fury,
fueled by kerosene of, how dare you? 

No, how dare I?

Bonfire-high flames as tall as trees 
spout up, reflected in my eyes.
Blue hues losing me in the night sky.

Out of control, the flames
pop out of holes traveling
from one dead stump to another.
We all burn in the ghosts 
of our mothers.
No way to soak this 
without a firetruck. 
Will that be enough?
Will it all collapse,
light the columns of my porch,
turn brick and shingle to ash?
Will the damage be permanent?

Tears rush down my face.
When did I get so angry?
Fear turned the corner. 
Helplessness filled the door.
Opening up to, you’ll do it my way.

NOW!

Another log burned black, 
cratering amber center,
splits open the heart,
shaking my limbs,
filled with thoughts of,
they are better off 
with someone else.
​
~Cynthia Schaefer