Today, I was inspired to write a poem. I used to write poems all the time as a young woman, but it’s been a long while. This one is about my daughter’s birth and came through me just like she. It will be included as part of my forthcoming book about writing one’s birth story…there are many ways to write a birth story!
As the waves grew steady and strong at the water’s surface
I duck dived down,
beneath this seeming tumult,
into the ocean of my being,
smooth and calm.
I past the threshold where “I” became “All”
and touched bottom,
the deepest place,
where from all beings are born.
I called out for your soul to join me
inside this singular body and
your light illuminated me from within.
Now fetched, I squeezed you tight and
worked
worked
worked
my way back to the surface.
As we neared the crashing waves again
my body opened for you,
Slippery and slender,
you swam forth courageously.
Hitting the air with unreckoned force,
You gasped,
I sighed.
The physical cord linking our bodies burst —
You were singular for the first time.
You cried heartily and
I felt the awe
Of watching a fish learn to breathe.
Though separate in body, our spirits mingled in the water still everywhere.
Soon that water turned crimson and it was time to turn for land.
Here I heaved and hoed, clearing myself of the remnants of an abandoned home,
no longer meant for shelter.
Your father, the sun, held you brightly
As your mother, the earth, shuttered and shook until settled once more.
You returned to the earth’s embrace where you fed from wise waters
Meant to sustain you completely for days, months, even years, to come.
You learned to drink steadily and gain deep nourishment
like you’d known from the tree at your source.
Every molecule of the new air you breathed
was bursting with
Love
Wonder
Gratitude.
We drank it in together.
We held you in this bubble of bliss until it became us and
we three launched out into the life we’d charted long ago
to walk hand and hand
Here.
Together.
Different bodies,
A singular heart
Pulsing to the rhythm of Love.
