Transition

In Transition, a mother is trying to provide solace to her son whom she knows will soon die. The mother is my mother and the son is my younger brother. A month before cancer took my brother’s life, I asked him and my mother to pose for their final portrait together. My brother is resting his body on my mother’s lap and she is caressing the man to whom she gave birth but now must see through his final days. In this image, there is sadness—the certainty of an imminent loss of a life – and the beauty of my mother’s compassion and love as she holds the plastic bag that has collected the poisonous liquids drained from his body, and as she hopes and asks for a little more time with her son behind what seems to be a crying wall.