My mother calls and asks the date.
She wants to write a check
and doesn’t have it right.
The lines jump around
and she can’t find her place
once she looks up–
Wasn’t there an envelope to put the check?
What happened to the pen? –
then down again.
Who’s it for? I ask, a test.
She can’t quite recall.
Ira, I remind her.
I don’t like Ira, she replies.
Then why send him a check?
She laughs, my mother, always the one who gets the joke.
You want I should send it?
That’ll be nice, she says;
it makes me nervous.
Twelve bucks, I tell her. Don’t blame you a bit.
She laughs again and says
she can’t remember why she called.
This time it’s me who laughs–
I tell her, May the third.
I’ll write that down, my mother says,
for future reference.
Then waits a beat and adds,
When’s that?
Alan Walowitz is a poet who’s been writing for quite a few years, and currently in Nassau County, where he keeps his eye on New York City proper from his doorstep. He teaches some days at Manhattanville College in Purchase, NY, which is a little north.
Categories: Mental Health, Poetry, Themed
Tags: Alan Walowitz, e-zine, ezine, hyperbole, longing, May the Third, melancholy, melancholy hyperbole, Mental Health, new, poem, poet, poetry, poets, submit, writing
Melancholy Hyperbole 
It made me laugh when I was all set to cry. Of course I’m crying inside and my eyes are burning wet.
Thanks for capturing her spirit again and again. How she lives on.
This poem is full of love.
We never really lose the ones we love. Our memories keep them alive and they stay with us always.
It is truly wonderful that we can remember and share the many humorous occasions that occurred between our mothers and ourselves. It is obvious that your Mom was a very special lady.
I truly related to the poem about your
Mom. My Mom was similar at the end of her life. Your poems always capture so much about life
Taking your audience from tears to laughter..and some of us via an “off ramp,” a moment for personal experience reflection…ADMIREABLE! THANK YOU!