Sonnet Writing - Ode to Mother

 Ode to Mother

Arabella

Often I had seen and heard the whispers

that she in youth, a geriatric plague

with hands weaker and the water crisper

on her withered tongue as she spoke so vague.

Her shallow breath and neck beaded with sweat

as the pulse gave out and the foe now dead

and muffled shouts I would never forget

for only a cadaver on her bed.

The voice she commanded erased from mind

as tentative years the future would hold

and the absence of guidance left behind,

the total waste of stories untold.

Life after death, for a daughter's belief--

a deer she became to aid from one's grief.