In dreams they are together, mother
Sometimes curled with a book, daughters
ask for another story and peace
slowly emerges after pain
stole the flavor at the table
where demands overshadow love.

Where is the love
the daughters keep asking mother.
Each night a delicious table
is set, loving hearts of her daughters
begin with appetites, but dessert is pain.
Everyone leaves hungry for peace.

Glistening eyes starving for peace,
no one remembers the flavor of love
when the palate is overpowered with pain.
Maybe it will take mother
choosing another place for her daughters
at a healing table.

Years later the new table
is full of flavors and peace.
For the first time the daughters
recognize the salty sweet love
sprinkled on every dish from mother.
No more bitter taste of pain.

Letting go of the past pain,
it no longer sits at the table.
Finally she lets go of her guilt, mother
seeks to find the kind of peace
that grows through patient love
and the forgiveness of daughters.

In dreams they are together, daughters
fully released from pain,
now immersed in unselfish love.
They gather at the abundant table
and hear the sweet music of peace.
They dance the heart rhythms of mother.

In dreams, mother and daughters remember pain,
shared dissonance where there was no peace,
but from pain, scarred hearts grow and the table is love.

By Kelly Waterbury