Poetry and Creative Writing for All

Alan W Davies

Born in 1945, proud dad to four sons and one daughter, and now granddad to eight, soon to be nine grandchildren, my family have been the inspiration for many of my poems. I also love to watch people and nature, and draw a lot of inspiration from this. I have created a collection of poems called ‘People Watching’ that this poem, ‘A Single Mom’ is from.

I am a member of the ‘Walsall Wordsmiths’ and of the ‘Jerome k. Jerome Poetry Group’

A Single Mum

In her thirties, with looks that are par for the course,
Of a woman depressed by impending divorce,
But behind the facade of a well made-up face,
Are the hurt and the fears that she hides with good grace,
Her husband has gone to a new, younger bride,
And she hates him for hurting her kids and her pride.

So to raise her three kids on her limited wealth,
She feeds and clothes them, without thought for herself,
And she’s working to help keep the wolf from the door,
But only part-time, to be back home by four,
That’s when her children get home from their day
Of trying to pretend things are really okay.

But things aren’t; so once more she will try to explain,
As she has done before and no doubt will again.
Her children are young and can’t understand why
Their dad doesn’t phone, and all Mom does is cry.
They say time’s a healer and she hopes this is true
As she really doesn’t know what else she can do.

Although sometimes she’s lonely, she’s never alone,
But this must be the scariest time she has known,
The future she’d hoped for has gone with her man,
And although she makes ends meet as best as she can,
There’s no one to help if things go the wrong way,
And no one to hug at the end of the day.

Late at night when the children are tucked up in bed
Is the time when her doubts and fears rush round her head,
But then from the silence of a bedroom upstairs,
A little voice says, ‘Mom; we love you; we care.’
And at the end of the day it will all be worthwhile,
If she only succeeds in making them smile