To My Mother' Statue of Buddha above the Kitchen Sink

The ceramic reincarnation
does not smile gluttonously
or hold a drooping stomach like so many of its counterparts.
Instead, the arms are long and brown
like my mother’s.
like hers,
the eyes are wide as bay leaves,
deep and aqueous as the Ganges.

My mother is not a Buddhist.
When I was a child
my mother would warn me
of leaving the house,
and the biting ticks in the tall grass outside,
and I would have nightmares
Of tiny black specks expanding on my skin
until I was eaten alive.
When I was older
my mother would warn me of love
and I would dream of something more terrible
devouring me from the inside.

When my mother washes the dishes with so much fervor,
I wonder if she regrets
Holding onto her worrying
for ticks or love or all the other consuming factors of life.
I can imagine then,
that she keeps the statue on the windowsill
for one reason:
So that when she looks up,
her hands, thin and flat like the Buddha’s,
scrubbing away at layered disquietness,
And beholds the closed eyes
so similar to her own,
for a moment instead
she may feel as though
she is standing
in a pond of lotus flowers
and that she will never
be afraid again.