Delivered & Formed

They told me a mother

Is the one who created you.

And so

She delivered me.

From her womb

I Burst forth violently

Without warning

Without meaning

Without cause

Without a home

Without another to guide the way

Without that 40 week incubation period

Where Mother prepares herself for the trials ahead

Where Mother gives her and her child a soft place to land

After the trauma

Of forming another life.

There was no time. There was only action.

I pass through her flesh

Spring from her veins

Soak up her blood

Spit out fluids and mucus

From the brief gestation.

And I cry. And cry. And cry. And cry.

She had the mind to not

Shut me up

Or leave me on a corner

For dead

Or for another existence

Apart from her arms.

She sat in her car

In winter

And held me to her bare chest

My heart beat matching hers

To calm my infant wails.

The heat keeping us both

From shivering.

She bites her lip,

Kisses my brow,

Promises another life

For her and her boy.

Long days.

Checking the phone

Calling her contacts

Zipping her dress in

Someone else’s house

In a cramped hotel room

While I lie naked, cooing on the starched sheets.

But she pieces it together

That life she promised

That life she grasped for before

And achieved

Only to have it ripped away.

At least

With this new, created creature

She had formed inside of her

That was Hers, alone

There was hope of

Tomorrow,

Next month,

Next year, even, if they are lucky

And she counts her luck

Like quarters

Sealed in a glass jar

To pay for a rent that would

Demand attention again

Soon.

For the first time

She shared a heart

With another being

For her blood

Pulses in his veins

Her fire

Her grit

Her body

Lactating her nutrients

For him to swallow

To make him strong.

To make her stronger.

Young mind

Young body

Young life to live

But now he is here

And what can she do but

Hope

And wait

For her Sun to explode

To become like her.

A lesson a day

Because the days keep coming.

Healthy babies

Can grow faster

Can talk sooner

Can form complex thought

Before they sink underwater again.

That isn’t an option.

Falling again below

The thin line of

Winning

And

Disappearing forever

In a list of names and faces

That grows rapidly.

The ones who were cut down.

It can’t be

Because now

It is no longer

Just her body she must sustain.

She found me at a crossroads,

Consumed me

And bore me out again

For her purpose

For one purpose.

Apollo was always meant to be

And she knew

His delivery was a miracle

She alone performed.

A fate charted in the stars

A trial to test her

To refine her edges

That were exhumed from

Solid rock.

Artemis took a half baked boy

And made him into a person.

Despite the labor

Despite the judgement

Despite the challenge of

Dividing her cells

A thousand times over

Knitting them back together

Just to give them all

To the being that

Would be cut from her

Body

And walk around

With her heart.

And that is a Mother

To me.