Not in Her Nature

[a poem inspired by the Totally Optional Prompt, work.]


Not in Her Nature

It is not in her nature to be still.

As a child she loved to run.
She would run, and run, and run
until her lungs hurt and
only then would she stop.

When she was still a child herself
she was paid to babysit smaller children.
She would go early in the evening,
feed them dinner,
bathe them,
put them to bed.
I think she made a dollar
for the whole night.

When she was twelve
she started working
at the drugstore,
behind the lunch counter
and soda fountain.
She made every kind of
ice cream concoction
with all kinds of flavors
until she got so that
even today
she only likes vanilla
or strawberry.

She got married before she
graduated from high school.
She no longer had to work
at the lunch counter, but
she added the job of
housewife
to her duties as student.

She worked for her family
until
it wouldn't work any more.
Then she worked to make money
to support her two children,
who lived with her mother.

When she married again,
she still had to work,
because the man had given
what he made before
to his ex-wife.

They worked alongside each other
in business,
building a house,
and then another family.
Their children knew
they would be expected to work
one day, and as practice
they had chores to do.

And the woman worked
to make the house clean and beautiful,
to keep the yard healthy and neat,
to teach her children to be responsible,
to help out at the schools,
to help with the scout troops,
to help with the church.

And then,
when the man retired,
partly because he was old,
but more because he was sick,
she worked as his nurse,
because she loved him,
and because
it is not in her nature to be still
and let others "do" for her.

And now that the man is gone,
she works to keep the house clean
and the yard neat, and
her lungs hurt just going up stairs.

But even now,
it is not in her nature to be still.