Barbara Lewis Duke, pretty, petite, blue-eyed and blond, my
mother, one fearless, controlling woman. Long after Mom’s
death, Dad said, “Barbara was afraid of absolutely on one
and nothing.” They married late, 34 & 38. He adored her
unconditionally. She filled my life with horses, music, love,
cornfields, hay rides, books, and ambition. Whatever she felt she
had missed, my sister and I were going to possess: books,
piano lessons, a college education. Her father, who died long
before I was born, loved fancy, fast horses. So did she. During
my preschool, croupy years, she quieted my hysterical night
coughing with stories of run away horses pulling her in a wagon.
With less than one hundred pounds and lots of determination,
she stopped them, a tiny Barbie Doll flying across the Missouri
River Bottom, strong, willful, free.
Note: This was first published in an anthology and later in my poetry memoir, “On the Rim of Wonder.” My mom loved the color pink and roses, had a rose garden. In the summer there were always crystal bowls on the dining table with roses floating. Today I have roses floating in two stemmed crystal bowls in my kitchen.
writingontherim 