Mama?

Three times today in Fez, Morroco

she heard a child

call the searching question,

“Mama?”

At the Hamam

in the steamy warm communal bathing rooms,

small girls

teenage girls

nursing mothers

grandmothers

are naked and bathing

enjoying intimacy and friendship.

A small girl calls out “Mama?”

Through the small square window of the riad,

she heard a young boy calling out

 down the hallway of the neighbouring ancient stone riad,

“Mama?”

And now, sitting on the roof terrace of the riad,

as the call to prayer rises up echoing across the Medina,

a beautiful Fez girl on the crest of womanhood

calls down from the neighbouring roof terrace,

“Mama?”

Mama, you are eternally and deeply needed.

From our beginning to our ending, we need you.

“Where are you Mama?”

  27^th April 2011