MOTHER

MOTHER

They said you were growing inside me.But I knew better. You were closer than that.My body was yours. Your breath was my breath. Your heart was mine.“You must be happy," they said. “Congratulations. You’ll be a wonderful mother.”I didn’t know. Great terrors welled up inside me. Ecstasies too. At times I felt such a profound loneliness. Like nobody understood, even my closest friends, my family, my husband.My pain was your pain, little one.

My joys, my sorrows, my fears, my hungers, all yours. And yours, all mine.Strange sensations. Aches. Tenderness, twitches.Mood swings.Nausea. Jesus, the constant nausea. Blood, everywhere. Backaches. Heartburn.

Everything on fire.If I’m honest, there were times I blamed you. Wanted you gone from me. Wanted to cut you out, the ultimate betrayal. You broke my heart and shattered my dreams. An old life gone, a new life growing. A death, a birth, a crisis of faith.Sometimes I didn’t know if I still wanted you. I can admit it now.Yet there were times I needed you so badly. TimesI couldn’t imagine living without you. Times you were all I had in this world. You were my reason for taking another breath, my reason for staying.

There were times I considered the knife, but you stopped me. The shame of it, such shame. And the guilt. The fear of myself. Cracking open. Fear of the things I could never share. Dark things. Visions. Movements in the night. The snake, the bat, the velociraptor. Demons, devils, enticing me away. Unknown things coming for my soul. The unconscious becoming conscious. Messages. The dead coming alive. Movements of the planetsin deep space. Strange connections, coincidences, inexplicable happenings.

Rumblings in the void. The collective fears of every mother. Trying to hold it all together. For you. For you.What to eat, what not to eat. To sleep, to wake. To move, to rest. To keep you safe. To keep you so safe. To keep myself safe. How to move as you grew. Everyone giving their advice. Leave me alone. Shut up. Leave me alone, all of you. My hand on you. Skin pulling itself tighter. Skin stretching, folding, peeling. Layers coming off.

Was that you moving? Do I feel you? Strange visions, feelings I can’t explain. New feelings. Confusing. Unbearable sometimes.Keep it in. Hold it all together. Put on a brave face.“You must be so happy. Congratulations. You’ll be a wonderful mother.”Wonderful mother? Like my own mother? God.And then the day you came out. Pushing, pushing, and you, not coming, not coming. Pushing, and a fuck-the-world kind of pain, and no, I don’t think men could understand, really I don’t. Rupture. Flesh breaking. Gushing, spewing, the searing of a universe.Happy now?Bloody, bruised, naked but alive, there you were! Mind stopped. Mind gone. Mine. Not mine any longer. Yet mine, so mine. And beautiful. Beautiful. Perfect. Shattered, yes, but perfect. My heart breaks a thousand times, and you mend it a thousand times over.You had a face, your own. Such a face. Legs, arms, too. Eyes that knew. Eyes like mine. You grew from inside me but appeared outside. You shape shifter, you miracle, you little boy.You breathed for yourself. My little boy, breathing for himself.And suddenly, I missed the days we breathed together. Nostalgia for those days. But I loved that you breathed on your own. The joy and the sorrow of it, I cannot explain. I could barely hold it all in my exhausted heart. Dependent, independent. One, but not the same.My son, my sweet little boy, I don’t know if you were born that day, or you let go of me, or an old life died, or all three.

Why was my heart breaking, when everyone around was weeping for joy? Did you know the answer?My little boy. My slimy, bloody, screaming for your life, announcing your arrival to all who would listen little boy. Cutting us apart, yet we could never be apart. We are two hearts made of the same heart, two breaths that once were indistinguishable. I would die for you, give you my heart, my brain, my face, my everything.I am your mother, and you are my son.And if King Solomon pronounced his judgement, Iwould not even need to think. The answers is yes, my love, the answer is yes. Have him, have him, have him you liar, have all of him, not half of him but all of him, and keep him safe, and love him theway I love him, and I will hold him in my heart, and he will find me, I know he will find me, one day, one day, he will break his chains and he will find me, he will find his way home, for his body was mine, his breath was my breath, and our hearts still beat as one.

- Jeff Foster