Poem of the Week: “My Mother Declares on Bloomsday” by Mary O’Donnell
A daughter ponders whether her aging mother’s refusal to yield to her care might not be a rejection of decline but rather an affirmation of life.
My Mother Declares on Bloomsday
It’s no simple task, it’s no simple task
to guide an elderly woman to the shower
on Bloomsday, when the world
and Molly echo yes, yes, yes,
and she echoes no, no, no,
because what remains of her life
relies on the freedom of saying No.
How reminiscent of Joyce
for her to resist the sanitized conscience
of filial care, your obligation
to remedy her imperfections and smells,
to wash hair and teeth,
tend to toes when all she desires
is to drift on the lily-leaf of her own
green bedspread, with drowsy Molly
entwined in a tangle of snow-white hair.
Now, dreams enfold her
more than discussions of showers or meals,
the streaming waters of memory
rise and caress her skin
right where the mattress soothes
spine and bones
in that room with yellow walls.
Hello, my love, she addresses
his photograph, blowing kisses
toward the mottled frame.
To her, then,
the logic of affection,
to her, the logic of No,
her untamed tongue.
Mary O’Donnell’s latest collection, “Massacre of the Birds,” presents a broad feminist perspective, addressing various environmental issues, recounting the “ordinary” experiences of female sexual abuse (#MeToo, 12 Remembered Scenes and a Line), and, on the other end of the spectrum, celebrating the joys of inhabiting a woman’s body (The Men I once Knew).
A series of loosely connected poems, narrated by a daughter caring for her widowed mother, occupies an intriguing position on this spectrum. Traditionally, caregiving responsibilities within families fall upon women, often without compensation or acknowledgment. While these poems could have protested against such exploitation, they turn out to be more about celebration than protest. They are love poems in their own right.
“My Mother Declares on Bloomsday” begins by highlighting the demands on the caregiver: “It’s no simple task, it’s no simple task…” The physical exertion is compounded by the patient’s resistance; and Bloomsday, a day of celebration symbolizing female sexuality, seems to have lost its significance for the speaker. The mother’s repeated “No” negates more than Molly’s affirmatives. However, the poem reveals that this “No” serves another purpose entirely, rejecting the mundane routines of physical care for what the body, even in old age and frailty, truly craves.
The soliloquy that concludes James Joyce’s “Ulysses” is a journey into Molly Bloom’s consciousness, ultimately leading her from current infidelity to her husband, Leopold, to memories of their initial intimacy, with the implication that their marriage will be revitalized. Molly’s final recollections resemble “the streaming waters of memory” for the mother in O’Donnell’s poem.
O’Donnell chooses an interesting verb when describing the caregiver’s task (and necessity) to “fix” the mother’s “imperfections and smells.” While the primary meaning of “fix” here is to correct or repair, the secondary connotation lingers. The woman subjected to these washing and changing routines is also being “fixed” in her decline. The caregiver rejects this reduction. Swiftly, the poem transitions to a scene of delight, the mother’s restoration to comfortable repose on the green bedspread in a room with yellow walls. These are the hues of nature and sunlight. The elderly woman herself is rejuvenated, transformed into “drowsy Molly / enfolded in a tangle of snow-white hair.”
In an earlier poem, the mother is depicted as a woman who experienced a marriage so fulfilling it seemingly excluded her offspring. In “My Mother Declares on Bloomsday,” we witness the paradoxical isolation of the caregiving daughter. While the poem’s focus is on the mother’s resolute defiance of care, the true impact occurs in the final couplet, when, returned to bed, she addresses her husband’s photo with “Hello, my love,” and showers kisses upon the “mottled frame.” Here, we sense the renewed force of the earlier notion of a “Joycean” rebellion against “the sanitized conscience / of filial care.” If there’s any bitterness or irony in assuming the mother’s perspective in the preceding lines, it is overshadowed by admiration. The term “Joycean” is undoubtedly meant as a compliment.
The restrained depictions of the mother’s washing and grooming are brief glimpses of bodily vulnerability that neither invade privacy nor diminish dignity. The poem is profoundly feminist in its recognition of the mother’s complete humanity and womanhood. She possesses a capacity for sensual pleasure as well as defiance: the aging body is allowed its eroticism. Perhaps she is not merely a counterpart to Molly but a female Ulysses, who, after a lengthy voyage, is finally nearing home.