Out of Step

chocolate cupcakes 
made with Diet Pepsi 
because eggs are so expensive 

my grandson is fourteen today
tall and skinny as a sapling
his voice deepening

the dark fuzzy mustache
I see the baby he was
and how his entrance came

the day my mother
asked me to write her obituary 
my heart jumping from

delight   to   dread   delight   to   dread
when I held you   boy  
for the first time
I was filled 

with the eternity of it all
the smell of your crown
the way you 

actually smiled 
on that first day
you looked right at me

such a gift since your autism
would soon shift your gaze 
to the side of me

and my mother survived 
the quadruple bypass and 
and my pen stayed in my purse 

how that was the day 
my sister decided
not to hide 

her hatred of me any longer
how confused I was  
how full of rain and rich full sun

and being human 
how out of step I was 
with everyone

MAUREEN CLARK

Maureen Clark’s book This Insatiable August, released in 2024 by Signature Books, was named Best Poetry Book of 2024 by the Association of Mormon Letters. She has received two nominations for the Pushcart Prize. Her memoir Falling into Bountiful: Confessions of a Once Upon a Time Mormon won Honorable Mention in the Utah Original Writing Competition and is forthcoming by Hypatia Press.