After Her Mother Passed

Intro by Kwame Dawes

Here is an ele­gant flower of a poem — small, del­i­cate in sen­ti­ment, and yet so res­o­nant in mean­ing. Sam Dod­son, in a few short lines, observes the sto­ic strength of faith, the sad­ness of loss, and the rit­u­als that we per­form to help us cope with the help­less­ness that comes with grief.

by Sam Dodson

Lutheran beautiful Eva
broke down for a
dear, dear moment
before she picked
that rake back up
and moved maple
leaves over grass.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2021 by Sam Dodson, “After Her Mother Passed” from Big Life, (Black Mountain Press, 2021) Introduction copyright © 2022 by The Poetry Foundation.