When all life is gone, all that is left are tears of remembrance.

Red infected tears squirt from my half closed eyes, down my delicate cheeks and drop to the silk white dress I have embellished myself with.

I think the dress fitted my dame better; she never stained it with any blood and it stayed immaculate…well until an AK-47 bullet that came like a wrecking ball ripped her ribcage apart.

She became mute the minute the metal touched her dirty skin. All her cries and cries softened and she lay there on the pavement. Then I knew the grim reaper had cuffed her since it had been a while since he had been flirting with her.

My tear buds collected liquid and I effortlessly let them out; stained her dress for the first time with my red infected tears.

From then on it has been the case: staining it and later, when sober, rinsing it with warm water. Warm water that resembles my motherhood. I tried containing her blood that was spreading on the pavement but it was impossible to do so because, not only was her blood leaving her body; her loving soul and her motherly spirit, which I couldn’t catch and contain, were chasing the wind.

I tried watching the woman with soft clay in her hands who had moulded me into what I was running out of life-battery. I found no room on my memory stick, instead the memory hounds around and tempts me to get another Jack Daniels bottle from our closest pub. I should buy shares in that place. I am their most loyal customer. I pray every night and gulp bitter tasting mugs of vodka and wine afterwards. I’m an angel and this act is acceptable.

I mean Jesus turned water into wine. I am helping him finish the ones with price tags contained in the bottles that everyone labels ungodly. The heavens must be roaring with praises and applause. Maybe they should save those for when I finally sing for them. Singing with a broken voice, my mother’s cry echoing in my ears. I might just sing that out. A musician that cannot hold a note, just melodies of melancholy.

Will God listen or will He banish a drunken angel? Let me not worry about that and head to the store before Tasha comes back from the library. Tasha. Man! That diamond refracts a positive view of life into my shell and I praise my ovaries for carrying such.

She somehow saves me from my misery, I never have to take my inner child on a playdate in her presence. She’s got books to read for the kiddo and hush her cries, her cries for a mother lying six feet underground. She’s got brain cells that work like a whirlwind, with a solution to every wonder which leaves a person in awe.

I hear the door opening. That must be the return of the sunshine. Indeed, as soon as she steps in the house, like candles and colouring crayons, all light and colour is re-installed in the house.

“Hey mom, I’ve got these beautiful stories Phiwa and I have been working on. Please review them for me and tell me what you think.”

I ecstatically take the treasure book out and show it to her. She has been crying, I can see it in her eyes, all red and swollen up. I wanna erupt into an ear-piercing temper tantrum as she tells me how beautiful her day was and how she is dipping her toes into self-help ponds.

The vulnerability is written all over her countenance but she is still trying to act tough. I adore the way she always goes out of her way for me, giving me all the love and support. But right now, I feel like she’s the one who needs all of that now from me.
If my father were around, maybe he would hold my hand I’m drowning in the self-destroying pond, but he is not here. The taotie ducked two seconds after I was born; I would probably trip over him on the road. A reunion with him would be death-of-a-thousand-wounds boring, that I do not need. All I need now is my dame okay, smiling and uproariously laughing.

All she’s got is me. Why doesn’t she let me be the spindle fibres so I can hold the chromatid she is and pull her into the right space where healing art is a meal for any course of the day?
Maybe if amiable Phiwa was here he would know what is wrong with her, without her even telling, and we’d worm our way out of this.

I wish she were like Phiwa, just talking about her pain and letting me caress her scars without feeling as if she is weak doing so. How do I get her to understand that I love all of her, not only the happy her?

Okay the stories might just do the trick; she might find the pill to her misery and stop overworking her brain and emotions.

Only then she would have control over her conscious mind that works like a relentless overachiever, incessantly spinning around from thought to thought, stopping only when she sleeps – if she does – then starting up again the second her eyes awake.
Only then the demons screeching in her headboard would finally show their faces and I’d punch them for her, just like she always punches mine.

As I enter the room with two glasses of kiwi smoothies – her favourite – I’m caught by her smile and a, “Go rinse your fingertips, they are bleeding.”

***

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