Thanksgiving

My mother asks For someone to come to the hospital And make-up her face. My sister Karen goes to her. I have to tend to the turkey; the incoming relatives are the catalyst for her plea. Karen comes back and describes Mom Trusting her with eye pencil. Karen nervous--one false move and— The nurses have been having trouble finding “viable” veins. Mom’s eyes are hollowed out, scooped pockets, But, still, across-the-room blue, wide. Like Karen’s, and Karen put the make-up on, careful with the slack skin. She’s sobbing as she tells me this, later. I am jealous, and incredulous that this makes Karen sad, wish it was me who touched our mother’s face on Thanksgiving. That last month, November, my mother was constantly pissed: pissed at the nurses, pissed at the doctors, pissed at the pinching needles, the tubes in her way, the ugly, twisting gown, at us. The day after Thanksgiving, I got out of the elevator and could hear her, from down the hall, yelling, outraged, incredulous too, saying, “I raised five kids and you’re going to tell me I can’t pee by myself?” In the hall, I laugh aloud, I raise my fist in the air, for her, for us. Dylan Thomas was there, and we ran to her room, to watch her rail, to have her bless us with her rage.