O Child

O child I cannot speak:

I wish as I looked at her
That I had the words to comfort
Her, pain, would be mine,
So that I could do the crying;

She turns to me and says, O mother,
I cannot go on, it is anger; it is hate,
I want her to feel the still in her,
Life as it is to taste. But

Before and as the tears spill
Down the face of extreme emotion
I can touch nothing that will be hers to feel.
My condolence is her absence.
The abstract that makes her loneliness;

So that as I stand in front of her
There are spaces of indifference between us
And I can cry and I can scream,
But I will always be like this,
Till that day when mothers talk
When I say, it is you mum, whom I miss.