Some might say mothers are women who nurture, guide and raise their children, but when I think of a mother I think of a sword.
For a mother begins just as everything else...elements of certain configuration. But she becomes something more, something she could never have imagined herself to be, through trials of raising her children that are nearer to fire and a malleable quality to the forces around her than by some innate role of being “mother, mommy, mom.”
When her child is borne from her she experiences the first purge. A new creation is torn from her element-self of metal ore. She becomes gathered and enters the flame. While her metal is warm...when she is young with her child...her forming begins.
The world: her mallet. The Family: her anvil. Between them the woman is meted. Each strike...not out of malice or randomness but with guidance...creates in this woman a mother.
And as her child grows so does her strength. A sword.
A sword is a weapon and a mother is not seen as a weapon; yet she must be. She was created a warrior to fight and protect her children from any and all who would threaten or endanger them. For should a battle arise-with enemies as nefarious as cancer, Parkinson’s disease, and multiple sclerosis or foes such as financial struggle succumbing to debt or divorce and strained familial relations-it will be her deft strength that will see her family through.
But a sword’s strength is not in its weaponry; it is its art.
Forging metal requires great skill: the mallet must strike with a precision that can neither be too violent nor passive and it must be wielded by the hand of a master blacksmith...the Master Artist: God. For God alone knows the limits within which a soul can be transformed.
Should you ever get the chance to hear a forged sword when it strikes, listen to the sound it makes.
It is not unlike music,
not dissimilar to that of crystal when struck,
in fact, it echoes and its reverberating phrasing is
akin to a mother’s battle cry
guiding her children to victory
in this life, perhaps,
but more importantly...of forever.
K.A. SHOTT
