I Love Her, Mom

“I love her, mom,” he tells me.
He stands there in the dark, the only light illuminating him from behind.
Yet, he still manages to shine.
“I love her,” he tells me,
And his eyes are wide with fear.

“I need her, mom,” he tells me.
He stares at her sleeping form, there on the couch.
His lips part gently as his hand runs along her skin.
“I need her,” he tells me,
And his breath turns ragged with passion.

“I’m a pirate, mom,” he had told me.
He was four, and he waved his imaginary sword.
He told me he was after the buried treasure.
“I’m a pirate,” he had told me,
And he believed it with all his heart.

“I found them, mom!” he had told me.
He was six, and had come across the Easter eggs hidden in the backyard.
He popped open the plastic and in minutes his mouth was ringed in chocolate.
“I found them!” he had told me,
And his laughter rang genuine in my ears.

“It hurts, mom,” he had whimpered to me.
He was eight, and had crashed his new bicycle into the neighbor’s thorn bushes.
His face and arms were bloody, and his bike lay abandoned on the driveway.
“It hurts,” he had whimpered to me,
And tears poured heavily down his cheeks.

“You don’t care, mom!” he had yelled at me.
He was thirteen, and was sent to the principal’s office.
He'd gotten into a fistfight and had sent the other boy to the emergency room.
“You don’t care!” he had yelled at me,
And his fists clenched in anger.

“I hate you, mom!” he had snarled at me.
He was fourteen, and nothing I could say ever got through to him.
He fought against the world and didn’t know where to turn next.
“I hate you!” he had snarled at me,
And something in him snapped.

“You wouldn’t understand, mom,” he had told me.
He was sixteen, and the stench of marijuana was strong on his clothes and in his hair.
His eyes were bloodshot and his words were thick.
“You wouldn’t understand,” he had told me,
And his soul cried out for comfort.

“I’m scared, mom,” he had cried to me.
He was eighteen, and had seen in the mirror what he’d become.
Reality cut through him like a splintered blade.
“I’m scared,” he had cried to me,
And his fingers trembled in mine.

“I can do it, mom,” he had told me.
One year ago, he ached to be clean and free of his chemical addiction.
His pain showed clear in his every line.
“I can do it,” he had told me,
And he did.

“Can you forgive me, mom?” he asks me.
He sits down on the floor in front of her, his knees drawn up to his chest.
He thinks of all those years he hadn’t been around.
“Can you forgive me?” he asks me.
And he begins to cry.

“What’s to forgive, baby?” I tell him.
There in the dark, I kneel in front of him and touch his wet cheek.
I know he believes that I hate him for what he’s done.
“What’s to forgive?” I tell him,
And I take him in my arms.

“You’re my angel, Gabriel,” I whisper to him.
I try to forget the past seven years, when I thought I’d lost him forever.
I had lived them hanging onto what little I had left of my baby boy.
“You’re my angel,” I whisper to him,
And I try to let him fly.