Olivia Rahal is an incoming freshman student at the University of Oklahoma, double majoring in Acting and English: Writing. She has studied Acting at the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute for two years, where she was surrounded by many artistic disciplines; creative writing especially sparked her interest.
After 18 Years of Observing Mama
In my 18 years, Mama began as
crinkling brown butcher paper:
the kind used to conceal a quaint christmas gift,
neat and admirable:
temporary qualities.
Soon, the paper takes on
edges, creases, and points.
Mama’s neatness acts temporary.
I watched it fade so quickly, I am
baffled to still find its abundance
preserved in time:
photos taken before my 18 years.
Perhaps that moved me to so highly esteem pictures.
Pictures steal the fleeting from the clock;
the momentary morphs into a higher form:
permanence.
Mama can not endure permanence,
yet her perfect, pressed, platinum hair on
school picture day
survives,
Now, Mama begins to crinkle.
Her pale skin swallows her tired eyes.
God never gave her tired eyes.
Perhaps the fatigue, too, will fade —
temporary.
I wonder what other temporaries My Mama holds.