Dear Mama

When my mother says she doesn’t think she is beautiful,

I want to tell her that she is my home.

She built me, from scratch, and held me in womb, in arms, even now though I am setting down roots miles away my mother is my home.

Her walls were all I knew and her voice was the first music I heard, and she doesn’t think she is beautiful but I think she is so much more, that her hands were the first act of kindness I felt and her face was the first work of art that moved me.

I want to tell her she is my home, the ground beneath my feet, the vaulted blue above me.

The lines near her eyes are stories that I want to hear at night, each gray hair is a caught star, and every stretch mark is a sign that she is an artist because she has created.

My mother doesn’t think she is beautiful, but oh mama, you are so much more.