Mothers, Their Daughters

The succession culminates eventually
with a whimper on one hand,
an explosive disaffection on the other.
Half-way to the denouement
mother and daughter
convince themselves they are
the very best of friends, sharing
confidences, somehow coevals of
affectionate convenience, aiding
and abetting, aspiring to a common goal.
A mere interregnum on the journey
that progresses from dependence
to haughty sovereignty, and back
again in time to hapless need. Sons
cede to their mothers the naive fiction
of dominance, deferring by filial
courtesy. Daughters adopt disbelief,
affront and rancour as their workaday
tools of eventual rejection, cloaking
their personas in the guise of the
errant mothers. The final tedious revenge
reveals the mother, white, frail and
wizened; the daughter, teeth gritted
in despair, proffering tender care, still
best friends with her own daughter.