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Ball Square resident Marlena Merrin is a songwriter, musical theater writer, poet, and sometime improv actor. You can listen to some of her songs and read about some of her musicals at collegeboundthemusical.com. In her alternate life, under a slightly different name, she designs and analyzes IT systems for security and privacy.

“Not that Good a ….”

Marlena Merrin

There’s a young man I know
Whose brother sold one of the family cars
To fund an extended sojourn
On cocaine

Was the family upset?
Not so much, the young man said
“It wasn’t that good a car”

It’s been a year since you, Shirley, my mother
Gave up eating and drinking
So as to let the ground swallow you whole

Your escape
From a locked-down rehab facility
From being told what to do
Something you always hated

I was upset
Even though you’d had a long, long slide
Down
Shrinking not just your spine
But also your small treasury of interests

Tinier and tinier
Every year

A year later
I’m still upset
Tears stinging my eyes
Even though you weren’t that good a mother

A mother who didn’t
Want
To read her daughter’s stories
Or hear her songs

A mother who didn’t
Acknowledge
That the stories and songs
Even existed

A demented notion
Well before any
Diagnosis of impairment

Oh, Shirley!
(That’s what I called you)
You asked me (repeatedly)
In your later years
Whether you were a good mother

There have been worse
Far worse

But really
You weren’t that good a mother

And the only one I had

— Marlena Merrin

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