Ray's poem of
Sarah's birth, 1981
Deliverance
When I feel the need
to push
I pant.
Staccato breaths
arrest (temporarily)
the head
butting the dark,
ease the incumbent
flesh, allay the little
agonies of labour
until the quick,
complete surrender
to the weight of
rushing water. And
like water
like fire
the baby comes –
brutal, cruel,
and simply beautiful.
Then the flames
about the flesh
expire, and the body
bruised and bloodied
lies wasted on the bed,
broken like the husk
of some exotic fruit.
And after being blind
at birth
my mind now wakes
and leaps around the room
yet cannot rest or settle
until it holds the child
like vacuum a void
or fire a fever –
a void
only joy can fill,
a fever
only love assuages.
“Beauty is my child’s face.”*
Is there a more perfect sight than the face of a beloved child? Is there a more perfect feeling than stroking the softness of their skin? Is there a more perfect smell than inhaling their sweet scent as you envelope them in a tight embrace? These are some of the intoxicating wonders of motherhood. How I love to dwell on my child’s exquisite features, but no matter how long or how intently I gaze, the image is always changing. It is the nature of childhood.
* © from 'Being Mummy' by Anne‑marie Taplin, published April 2007