Poem | Erica Jong

Not With a Bang but With a Whimper (My mother died & the world did not end)   How I wish it were apocalyptically dramatic— the end of the world Armageddon, burning books of fierce fire, horsemen with spears, flaming suns sprung from trebuchets, dire projections of our stoned fantasy lives, awake, dreaming, dreaming our dreaming selves. But no. Breath slips away on pneumonia’s sweet white wings, eyes fix on the snowy park & can’t see but a blur of white, eggshell, cream, buttermilk & smeared smog. Both parents calmly left this world of pain. My one regret was not to be there for Papa, Daddy as I was for Mother, Mom, Mommy (as I never called her) Eda Mirsky Mann the glorious, great mother of daughters but no son. Painter, illustrator, costume-maker, designer of dresses she could cut & sew. Designer of tsatskelech, beloved wife, daughter, sister, who never knew how loved she was (or did she?), flirt & party-maker for her pals, painters, musicians, actors, but never crass colleagues of her husband’s trade. O how...

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