OTHER MOTHERS
Occasional denial aside,
all children lover their mothers
perhaps even those who never meet them;
the orphan, the adopted, the runaway, the rejected
Our earliest icons were mother figures-
Earth Goddess, Earth Mother
Mother’s Day, Earth day
Separate events, similar origins
Is any bond tighter than that
between mother and child?
But lest we forget, there are other mothers,
no less important, no less needed…
The mother dog,
confined at the puppy mill,
where babies are taken too soon
and sold for profit
The mother cow,
whose calf is taken at birth
and sentenced to a brief life
of horror in a veal crate
The mother chicken,
confined in a battery cage
never to see the light of day
never to see her young
let alone walk on real earth
among family and friends
The mother chimp,
murdered in the jungle
so her baby can be captured
and sold to the zoo or the lab
The mother pig,
confined to a gestation crate
giving birth on cold steel
and losing her children
to the butcher
and other mothers -
some called “pests”
killed without a second thought
to their grieving families
If we love our mothers,
must we not love all mothers
for their common value
to the great Web of Life?
And what of our universal mother,
Mother Earth, Mother Nature?
Will we ever truly love our mothers?