My mother’s hand the last morning as I sit alone with her—
already gone, though forehead still warm, petunias

outside the window, orange pink, bruised
as those on the narrow path once outside our home.

Light clings like mud to her flaking skin,
revealing fine cuts near her mouth,

“like paper,” they said as if clearing it with us
a technical problem that could be solved somehow.

Threads of hair I brush off her face,
dark flooded eyes ignore all warnings,

mouth once an open smile now hollow cheeks
fashioning a skull, despite how she knew everything.

I cannot understand how this brain interruption
can happen—where is the dividing line—

her childhood, the past
her adulthood, the past

old age, the past. Her eyes
coals over an open fire

warmed—
what she carries within
now fills this room.