As I rub my mother’s back
I wait and pray
That I will not feel her breathing shallow
Or her hot tears
Rolling down my forearms
A baptism of salty broken silence
I am reborn
With a little less
Each time
I am afraid that one day
There will not be enough of me
Left to encompass her
To suffocate the flames
Of a fire that reignites itself
On the whim of a whisper
of breeze