Mali Mann is a training and supervising analyst at the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis (SFCP). She is also an associate supervisor in child and adolescent psychoanalysis at SFCP and is an adjunct professor in psychiatry and behavioral science at Stanford University Medical Center We have featured one of her poems, titled “Mazandaran, Over the Ocean, Over the Mountain,” in the past and are now pleased to publish another of her pieces. This one is titled, “When you come back, bring your potted flowers.” She is a member of Pegasus Physicians at Stanford University, a forum for sharing poetry with other physician poets. Her new poem was screened by the Stadler Fellow and selected for a Pegasus poetry event at Stanford.
Your potted flowers on the porch whisper in the air;if you come back, your flowers greet me at the door,your paintings on the wall.Speak to me of living days.do not speak of cold graves, crying faces in the cemetery.tell me how I promised not to be thin skinned,how to feed children fruits of knowledge, wisdom and love.speak one more time of breaking bread with hungry ones,of human nature, the good that is not done.The love that is forgotten yet now given, the wrong that is undone;not getting lost in life's journey, not in here or anywhere.tell me how to bear true love or suffering.tell me how your life within me shows the way.tell me how your courage is my wardrobe,being here bare backed won't matter anymore.When you return, reenter, dancing.see the flowers, text books, pictures here to stay;dusty books sit solemnly on the shelves.When you come back there won't be war, hearts together, hands holding, windows open.death won't come, only when it is time to say goodbyes.Talk to me once more of life, love and liberty,Though not a privilege, but a responsibility.If you come back, no! When you come backbring your potted flowers to my dreams
Sheri Butler Hunt, M.D., is an adult training and consulting analyst and a child consulting analyst in the child division at the Seattle Psychoanalytic Society and Institute. A published poet and member of TAP's editorial board, she welcomes readers' comments, suggestions, and poetry submissions at .