Anita Haas
is a differently-abled, award-winning Canadian writer and teacher based in Madrid, Spain. She has published books on film, two novelettes, a short story collection, and articles, poems and fiction in both English and Spanish.
Some publications her poetry has appeared in include Quantum Leap, River Poets Journal, Poetry Quarterly, Vox Poetica, Verse Virtual, Wink, Songs of Eretz, Parody Magazine, Silver Birch and Founder’s Favourites. She spends her free time watching films, and enjoying tapas and flamenco with her writer husband and two cats.
June fifth
June fifth
was the day your life ended.
Or so you felt at the time.
On occasion you wished it had.
How disrespectful time is,
marching on
like nothing happened.
You cling to that day.
To suffer its hurt
over and over.
To replace the guilt you feel
for hurting
just a little bit less
every time.
You conjure up other dates;
The first date.
The wedding date.
The birth date of one baby,
then another.
But none imprints itself on your soul
like the cruel dates that followed;
diagnosis, and
cleaving, thieving,
June fifth.
The day his life ended.
Rebellion
“What time’s dinner, Mom?”
The nerve! He never asked her that before!
“Why? Got plans?” the acid on her tongue stung
like her slaps. “Dinner is when dinner is,
and you’ll be there!” And he was.
She prided herself on her control.
“Mommy! Can we stop to pee? Please!”
“Irresponsible! Shouldn’t have drunk that lemonade.
Now, wait and suffer!” And he did.
She was in the driver’s seat.
Now she is old. Son left …
to eat, to drink, to pee, to sleep, to wake,
to think, to live … as he pleases.
She lost control.
Dinner is when dinner is,
but her body no longer thirsts
nor hungers at the strike of six.
And it pees and sleeps and wakes when it pleases.
She lost control.
She eyes her arm … the one
which has recently chosen
to fall asleep when it pleases.
Has it spoken? The nerve!
It never asked her that before!
“What time’s dinner?”
Madness Muse Press 
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