By Gretchen Fletcher

I have been mother
to rock-chuckers,
work-shirkers,
back talkers
who have incurred
the wrath
of teachers, coaches,
choir directors, and
neighbor ladies,
and still I have loved,
as diaper rash gave way to acne,
colic to hangovers,
and the rock-chuckers
became
curfew-breakers
and car-wreckers,
and still I have loved
until the car-wreckers finally
became
job-holding,
bill-paying,
upstanding
members of society
who'd probably still like to
chuck a rock or two
now and then.

---

This poem previously appeared in Pudding Magazine.

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