Mother, child are you bleeding
Watching the world come down
The doors are locked, the streets are cold
Are you buried in the world's soul
Spiritually entwined
To live until you die
Mother hold my soul
And sew my pockets full of rubies
Take the candy from my teeth
And be please buried with me
Child holder of my soul
Asking help and talking tall
Bury my hands in your eyes
And let the both of us die
Caring earth holding faces
Of those we both hold dear
Hold us close
And bury both
Inside the home
Where we had grown
Mother, child are you bleeding
Watching the world come down
The doors are locked, the streets are cold
Are you buried in the world’s soul
Spiritually entwined
To live until you die.
I only cry on the inside;
Lamenting the child who's hiding there.
No one can know what is buried.
It's a weight that I must bear.
You may marvel at my strength;
Such fortitude is often rare
But all alone late at night,
I sink into despair.
The child will not let me sleep.
She needs the comfort of her mother.
I've searched a lifetime to replace her
But a mother's love is like no other.
So, I will strive to ignore the pain
And do better for my son.
I will be the mother I seek.
The child within and I are one.
February 23, 2025
Get out of that or I'll skin you alive she would say
Me and that dog would head for the woods right away
We were not abused
Just a saying used
Because me and that dog got a hug at end of day
You can never be ready, she said
I wasn't what you expected.
Listen,
No one told me "postpartum depression"
Until I saw you in the kitchen
With my baby sister at your feet,
White hot tears,
A savage grief,
Out of nowhere.
I was told to go play with my dolls.
Listen,
I thought it was my fault,
So I hid in my dark closet.
Listen,
When you couldn't care for us
I watched for you each day
With blue-brown eyes, mix of two loves,
Seeing your ghost,
The shadow of your blue coat,
In the window,
In the swirling, aching, endless snow
At the edge of winter.
Listen.
I am forever my mother's child.
Some say your words act as a balm
A fleet of sweet tidings
Sailing into a gray dawn.
With white sails riding
On the heels of a grand mast
That sways without invoking
A need for true ballast.
It seems as though your rage
That spars with mine among the waves
Has now chosen to disengage
From me among the graves...
Of sailors lost at sea
Displaced by blithely prying winds
And now what will become of me?
Whose multitude of sins
Imply that my veracity
Contends with your tenacity.
Hear Harry’s hysterical, startling scream.
Little spooky spiders made him run to the extreme.
It wasn’t a fairytale fantasy dream;
the cobwebs created a crazy football team.
Mother thought she’d heard their scary scheme,
so she planned to question the Queen.
I thought they were merely mean,
moving to our happy home, creating a scary scene.
She misses the time before she was a mother,
the life she once had now hidden, under cover.
Before pasta and paint, and plastic packed lunches
replaced lie ins and coffees, and trusting her own hunches.
She yearns for washed hair and fresh eyes without lines,
but knows, deep down, it’s for him her heart pines.
Coldest day yet, 'fore new bairn was christened,
mother's muse foretold as hearth embers failed.
Scripture held tight, she quietly listened,
as cradled creature withered, weeped, and wailed.
What secret kept a mother by proxy,
pallid face adorned in humanlike form.
Life borne so different any other,
unabashed at life's ex utero norm.
Green-gilled coveting mother's pride they wait,
singing forgotten changling's mirthful strains.
Off sibling snatched by fae's strange fostered fate,
sad imposter never thrived, yet remains.
Mother's cast away changling unwanted,
yet child's love remains true and undaunted.
I was so glad to welcome you
And it was such a joy to hold you
Never wondered how life could’ve been without you
For I wish My womb could never have carried you
Feed baby feed on some milk
Do not cry with fear i am right here
Close your ears listen to what I want you to hear
If I am to protect you with my life I would cover you in arms
I know you are starving and my body is drying
I can’t produce any more milk for I am starving too
Oh child
If I had knew tomorrow would bring war and harm you
I would never wished for your existence
My heart is bleeding my eyes are flooded with bloody tears
Can’t imagine how lonely you might be
Are there no mother angels please cuddle my child and tell him not to cry
Oh my dear child
I plead for peace
I plead for Justice
I plead for calmness
Is it not what we are fighting for less worth than our lives
Than the young children
Is pointing guns at one another necessary than a talk on a table
A talk on a table would save our tomorrow
Awake or asleep, I dream poetry.
What, how and when to write?
I think about it day and night.
When I sit deep in my thoughts,
Searching for the right words,
And when I count the syllables,
Using the fingers of my hands,
People think that I am mad!
For meals, if I fail to respond
To the calls of my better half,
And when I stay awake till midnight,
She warns me of wasting my time.
Only a poet can understand
The labor of a fellow poet.
The pain a poet undergoes
While writing a poem is…
Not less than that of a mother
Giving birth to her dear child!
More precious than pearls are they;
Diamonds come not near in value;
Their weight impossible to be
Measured in carats of gold.
Oceans carry not such vast
Turbulence…
They flow from broken eyes,
But stem from a shattered heart:
Squeezed and crushed,
Beating arrhythmically in
Loss devastating, pain perpetual.
Each drop of sorrow falls upon the
Meadows in heaven,
Flowers bloom in their millions…
Angels gather bouquets of devotion –
Prostrating, these they lay lovingly
At the blessed feet of the Almighty.
And the Creator embraces more warmly
The Precious One He has recalled to
Bliss and Love indescribable…
Dear mother,
I wish I was small again,
Like how you wish I was.
Maybe then,
You’d hold me like you used to.
we share the stars,
paths unknown to one another.
they call out to us and we remember -
we meet ourselves
walking together.
A pink flower to smell, watch a red ball bounce, see
a clown, a puppy to embrace, a mother's smile.
A child laughs at each new discovery--all a mystery
To see the world through a child's eyes
would be like looking through an unchipped
glass and suddenly see ourselves before
we became time-worn and world-wise.
A new lesson we'd learn daily, canceling
those tired tries. Everyone would be a friend,
even a tiny, interesting bug: no exceptions.
Think about this: a child assumes the world
is wonderful and wants to give it a hug; while
we've become complacent and accept wonder
with a shrug.
enchantment is seen
through the eyes of the children
we should open ours
June 6, 2022
for Like a Child contest
by Regina McIntosh
Why.
A child screams
A mother weeps
A father fears for his life
Bombs go off like fireworks
Homes
Are
Turned
To rumble
“What’s that sound, mommy?”
“It’s just some–um–dear why don’t we play a game?”
“What game, mommy?”
“Let’s pretend we are on a different planet.”
“Except this planet has been destroyed by evil aliens.”
“And the noise you hear is the sound of the aliens starting their ships to get away.”
“Okay, mommy.”
.
.
.
“Mommy?”
“Yes, love?”
“Did the aliens take daddy?”
.
.
.
“Yes, love.”
“The aliens took daddy.”
a child screams
a mother weeps
a father dies
3/7/22
Jade Ashlyn
Please Donate To Help The Victims Of Ukraine
No child should have to lose a parent
No spouse should have to lose the one they love
No one should have to flee their homes from bombs
No one
No one
No one deserves this devastation.
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