Waiting for Mothers Day

which should be a day,
when every mother
can feel secure

that her child is safe,
fed, warm, and happy

that there is no one
in the world
that has a problem
with the color of her child

that there is no bullet,
somewhere, in a box
that someday will be aimed
at her child, in hate.

that there is no eye, that
will ever look at her child,
and fail to see a miracle,
but, instead, a target

that there is no man waiting
to train her child
not to feel, but to kill
another mother’s child

At this late hour
on the second
Sunday in May,
I’m still awaiting
the real Mother’s day


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by Paul Stokstad

for Ruth Feggestad Stokstad