“MS Multiple Choice” by Anna Mindel Crawford

I would tell you what it’s like if I could [select one option]:

to be a child / a child carer / caring / in the care of a parent

who is sick/strong/fragile/brave/disabled, and unable to

comfort me / set boundaries for me / embrace me through

selfishness/selflessness/self-hate/self-care/self-awareness

which might be worse for her? / worse for me? / worse than –

death? living with the disapproval/help/pity/assumptions

of the teacher who is pronouncing her signature a childish

forgery; the thuds/crunches/screams/sobs as she’s falling

downstairs with my baby brother between shards of glass

and blood; or the screeching cars when she’s driving

and strangers are shrieking psycho!/drunk!/bitch!/cunt!

which all makes me angry/protective/ashamed/different/guilty 

because I can’t easily hate my mother / love my mother /

change my mother / leave my mother who is my only mother.

I would tell you what it’s like if I could.

***

Anna Mindel Crawford has had work published in Ink, Sweat & Tears (which won Pick of the Month in April), Propel Magazine, Wildfire Words, Visual Verse, and City Lit’s 2023 Anthology. A key theme in her work is memories, often related to her mother’s long-term illness and disability, and the loss of both her parents. She was awarded first prize in the Clevedon Literary Festival 2023 Open Poetry Competition.