She

sits, bent over the counter.
The last light is not yet turned out;
it spills over the top of her head,
auburn twirled with gray,
down her face, to her son's homework.

She
stares for a moment,
takes off her glasses and rubs her eyes.
She replaces the frames to her face,
lifts the next page,
pours over it, eyes following her finger.

Everyone is in bed;
She still sits
with the last remaining light
to make sure today's pages are precise.

It is in this same way, before the first frost of fall:

She
carries a single branch inside,
dangling a tiny chrysalis necklace.
Five days later, from a black cocoon,
the monarch emerges:
a winged witness to her care.