one more thing about my mother

my favorite recollection was when
she stuck her fingers in that cherry pie
(did it right there in front of the fluorescent-lit
deli section)
and pulled out two fat ones
gleaming red syrup
like movie prop stunt cum
sliding down her fingers
but never quite dripping
she held them up for some
imaginary live studio audience to inspect and approve
and with that sparkle of childlike glee in her eye
she slipped them into her purse

i asked her why she didn't shoplift the whole damn pie
when her purse could fit a buick
and she said,

'sometimes it's the little things in life you have to appreciate'

she patted me on the back
a tender
lingering touch

maternal almost

leaving two red trails that had the dog after me
for days before i thought to wash that sweater

this is my favorite memory of my mother
long before she started worrying about the things in her
head that rattled the bars and threatened to escape
and even longer before
the afternoon i came home from sunday school
to find my mother curled up on the closet floor
a bible in one hand and my father's
ivory-handled pistol minus a single rusted bullet in the other.