Rubik’s Cube
My mother behaved as if her life
were something being done to her
and a counselor told me that
very likely someone did something
awful to her when she was three
years old or so but she can’t remember
who or what so at some point
she confronts everyone in her life
with a convoluted problem
a financial crisis or a health concern
something insoluble it’s like
she takes a Rubik’s Cube and turns
it a few times but that doesn’t quite
represent how fubar she feels
so she breaks the pieces off
one by one but still she feels more
broken than that so she takes a hammer
to it and gets in my face
or my wife’s face or my sisters’ faces
or the face of some new friend
who hasn’t figured her out yet
and says you shattered my Rubik’s Cube
now put the pieces back together
matching all the pieces to other pieces
of the same color and I or my wife
or my older sister or our younger
sister or Mom’s new friend who hasn’t
figured her out yet foolishly tries
to fix what we didn’t break though
it’s clearly very broken so broken
that it can’t be fixed by anyone
and anyone who tries will soon
find themselves smashed into pieces
10 thoughts on "Rubik’s Cube"
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this sounds like playing the victim in the most familiar way
So many pieces within pieces here, Tom. Thank you for sharing such honest and powerful writing with us this summer.
OH!You give us truth, authenticity, and even in the frustration and trials of living with your mom and her mind, there is tenderness as well.
she confronts everyone in her life
with a convoluted problem
can’t be fixed by anyone
and anyone who tries will soon
find themselves smashed into pieces
You are so in touch with both her reality and the realities of those around her. Tara Brach, PhD is a clinical psychologist in Washington, D.C., and a Buddhist. One of her books is titled: Radical Acceptance. (I’ve read it 3 times over the years.) Reading your poem expresses, I believe, how you have come to terms with your mom, and she’s your mom!
Thank you for sharing this beautiful, compassionate poem.
This is so well-written and impactful. Your choice of form and the imagery of the Rubik’s cube is spot-on. Also I haven’t used the term “fubar” in ages but I’m bringing it back!
The rushing, headlong quality of this poem really supports the content. Excellent work.
Your poems about your mom this month have been strikingly strong and challenging in their brutal honesty, Tom. But I’ve also been conscious of something that runs just beneath your anger and frustration: the deep connection you have with your mother, like it or not. You are bound to her with what might as well be handcuffs. She lives in your head rent free, so to speak 😏, or else you wouldn’t be writing these poems. I’m in awe of the sincerity and vulnerability you show here. Thanks for setting this impressive example.
Brave and honest once again. Thanks for sharing with us as you give back to your mother what was never yours to carry.
Well put. Thanks for that, Pam, and for all of your supportive comments this month.
Tom,
Aah the strength it takes to walk beside loved ones with such excess baggage . . .
Your mirror mirror on the wall this month has been an alice in wonder land journey . . .
felt like plucking excess feathers off so it will now be easier to fly . . .
may you enjoy all the aerial views cleared for your free flowing first class flights
thank you for your writings this month
Darlene
Such emotional rush throughout– I couldn’t read the words fast enough to reach an inevitable end.
“and anyone who tries will soon
find themselves smashed into pieces”
As though you are writing of her effects on you and others, trying to piece it all together and stay whole.
Tom, you often do that hard, excavation work of poetry, and you craft these narratives that always leave me thinking–and enjoying that mad hair of humor you find in these spaces (even the hard won spaces). I appreciate you and your work. Happy LexPoMo!