You set out to do the extraordinary,
you brave, homeschooling mother
Armed with the consummate classics:
Tom Sawyer, Little Britches, A Wrinkle in Time
and piles of God's Heroes:
Amy Carmichael, Nate Saint,
and some days you think you'd rather be
on the Amazon with the natives
than in the living room with
your own flesh and blood,
who've got you at the end of your rope,
or is the end of the spear?
The oldest fusses over analyzing sentences
while secretly peeking at football plays
Another disappears from her math lesson
and magically reappears out the window,
a pendulum on the rope swing
And why is the youngest in tears over
their, there, and they're?
All day long you point
to the piano the dishwasher the next problem
the key word the vowel team the pile of towels
the board game spread across the couch
the half done science experiment on the counter
the dog
begging for dinner
You wish you could control their eyes
while your own wander to the
hummingbird at the feeder
and you privately long for wings
The words nag:
Am I enough?
And then you remember...
the first school was in a garden
So you say to the children,
let's go pick the rest of the vegetables
There is going to be a hard freeze tonight
And, blessed, you call it a lesson in
biology, meteorology, home ec, and religion
Suddenly you notice
their roots have eased down a little deeper
and you feel just a little braver
today
