My mother is a spiritual tigress of a woman. Hair that spurs out of her scalp like fire, mouth like a grenade, and the hug of a down blanket when it hits below 30. She is an incredible site to see when she meditates. In the past 10 years, I've seen her deepen the taupe hollow orbs under her eyes and forgive her concealer for not covering them up, hands on her knees, covered in white flowing harem-like-pants, fingers praying aum, eyes shut and breaths quick and embarrassingly shallow.

After the divorce, after I lost myself in therapist-link diagnoses, after she bared witness to child abuse and while she derived a snarl-faced, creeping joy from calling my father a motherfucker over email for being a monkey hearted Muslim, she seemed to find herself able to create a center, even if just momentarily, through prayer. Breath of Life, I Bow to You, Ong Namo, Guru Dev Namo. A song by a white woman in a turban, so teary beautiful it made me sick and shrunken.