Who is not our neighbor?

I might have learned this language from Valarie Kaur's See No Stranger (2021), but the foundation was set in my mother's home where we grew up with her practices and her hooked rug.  This is a tribute poem I wrote for my mother in 2019, and revised in 2024 after her death:

Who is not our neighbor?

My mom spelled this out in her large hooked rug that hung over our couch for four decades: Love thy neighbor as thyself.

We drank in this faith while waiting for her to finish conversations with passersby, while watching her draw animals, trees, and buildings.

We watched love emerge in landscapes and still lifes, and hung them on the walls until what was white space became much like a forest.

Who is not our neighbor?  Her smiles and kindness created neighbors along with homemade cookies and recycled and repurposed clothing.

We were surrounded by piles of what could not be simply tossed--magazines, egg cartons, coffee grounds, eggshells, and glass bottles.

Who is not our neighbor? Mom asked by cutting plastics before disposing of them, by thinking into the future of her children's children.

She and dad shared the faith of birds, providing food until their safety depended on guarding nests and feeders from rescued kitties.

Mom has never had much use for distant gods or  godhead except for how it shows up in trees, neighbors, and neighborhoods she loves.

And she draws, gathers and assembles this vision into art--images whose humility surpasses that of altars in some churches I've known.  

These are the sermons I attend to. We were surrounded by the faith of our mother.  Her art surrounds us still.  Who is not our neighbor?

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My blog poems are rough drafts.

Please respect my copyright. 

© 2019 Susan L. Chast

Published in Grieving Into Love (2020), p. 65.

Revised 2024 as a tribute poem.

Mom Died 1 May 2024

 

          I cried in the hospital when the nurse said she was “concerned that Dot might not last the night.”  With our consent, she removed Mom’s intravenous bags and brought me a comfortable recliner to stay by Mom’s side. 

          Tears softened me into sleep before the moment Mom took her last breath. I remember seeing her sleeping gently with small gasps, then I woke to her silence, her not breathing, her peacefully passed to another world.  

          I cried again for a hot minute of sudden loneliness.  But how calm she looked with the stress and pain gone from her face, how youthful and free. She “wanted to live like a normal person,” she told me only a week before, frustrated at being bed-ridden and all the indignities that accompanied it.  Only 2 weeks ago, she had been walking and independent. The turn around had been swift, but she was prepared.

          A few months before Mom had drawn me into "the talk," trying to prepare me for her death.  "I'm not going to live forever," she said, "though I'd like to see 100.  I love you--always have and always will.  And I know you love me, too.  It's good.  I want you to know I know, so there will be no regrets."  
          I cried then, too, but didn't let her see the tears.  "I'm expecting you'll live 'til 108," I replied.  She smiled, I smiled, and there were some more words but those were the important ones.  

          Mom would have been 100 years old in two months, on July 7, 2024.

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Obituary

Dorothy Anna Berner Chast “Dot Chast”, 99 of West Coxsackie died May 1, 2024.

Born in Queens, Dot Chast lived in Coxsackie and Athens, NY for most of her 99 years. Since her High School years as an art major, she had a sketchbook in hand. Her artwork crosses all media, especially oil and acrylic painting, pastel, pen, and ink, watercolor and printmaking. In addition, she has been a sculptor, a fabric artist, and a wood carver.

She was a member of Greene County Council of the Arts, Columbia County Council of the Arts, The Woodstock Art Association and Museum (WAAM), Tivoli Artists Gallery, and the Athens Cultural Center. She was a member of the Greene County Arts and Crafts Guild, Inc. for almost 40 years. She frequently exhibited in juried shows throughout the Hudson valley and was honored to have fifteen different solo shows through the Greene County Council on the Arts, Prattsville Museum, Columbia Greene Community College, Congregation Anshe Emeth, Tivoli Artists Gallery, and the Cornell Cooperative Extension Center. She facilitated drawing classes at Columbia Greene Community College (Yes, You Can Draw) and many classes for Senior Citizens in Pencil, Pastel, and Oils.  

In addition to participating in arts organizations, Dot was a member of the West Athens Lime Street Fire Auxiliary for decades. The volunteer fire company was very important to her, as was mutual assistance neighbor to neighbor.

Her husband Joseph died May 11, 2019. Mother of George Chast (Sheila), Peter Chast, and Susan Chast, grandmother of Stephen (Tina), Mark (Jennifer), Eric (Tricia), and Craig (Noelle), great grandmother of Abigail, Natalie, and Cohn, aunt of Donald (Sheila) and Michael (Laura) and their families.

Calling hours will be held on Sunday, May 5th from 12:00 – 2:00 pm at Millspaugh Camerato Funeral Home, 139 Jefferson Hgts., Catskill. The burial will be private.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to a local art or service organization.

Messages of condolence may be made to www.MillspaughCamerato.com.

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Please respect my copyright.

© 2024 Susan L. Chast