For Naomi - On Her Birthday

Poet?

NO.

I am no poet.

Alas, I hereby beg the pardon of you who write poetry; my Dad, and Chani.

And you who read it with an ear for letting it "live in you"; my Dad and Chani...and most of the rest of us.

I beg this pardon for the poem I intend to share.

Which I share

Only because Aubrey wrote so beautifully this morning about her first daughter who turned 12 yesterday. Who is a lady in every respect.

She blooms.

Oh, how this little girl blooms.

Aubrey speaks of a photograph I took in 1997. This image I captured on 35mm, black and white, Ilford film that had been purchased in a large roll that was manually wound up into a used film canister in a dark closet so as not to expose it prematurely to light. I clicked with a fully metal, fully manual Nikon F3HP.

Those were the days before omni-digital.

I set the shutter speed.

I set the aperture.

I set the moment of our realization of the possibility of Naomi, in stone.

___

I took that picture when you, Naomi, were the spark of life itself.

Dividing...

and dividing...

and dividing asunder...

the philosophies of man that would have me believe that the hand of God played no part in the orchestration of you.

But He did.

___

Then I wrote a poem.

Which I do sometimes...shrouded in the pages of journals rarely opened by hands other than my own.

I prefer prose -the blessed meadow with no barbed wire, strong-arming me into submission.

Prose is...eating chocolate chip cookies and milk in my pajamas and slippers.

Poetry is...singing "Both Sides Now" on karaoke in front of Joni.

One is less comfortable than the other.

If the the photo were taken in the age of digital, I would place it here to couple it with this poem. If it were taken in the age of digital it would be a more beautiful photo with with two clicks of my mouse. Instead it is a black and white rendering of my mother braiding my sister, Aubrey's hair while sitting at the table in the kitchen of the home we grew up in. It is slightly over exposed and lacks the contrast Picasa grants me regularly on the photos I take now...in the age of digital.

Aubrey was sick to her stomach that morning.

My Mother has NEVER missed an opportunity to inquire about,

wonder about,

dream about,

pray about,

welcome with the most brilliant joy,

the possibility

of a grandchild.

While her hands were full of Aubrey's hair, my Mom asked, "Could you be...?"

"Yes, I could be."

"Are you?"

"I don't know."

She was.

It felt like a secret joy when I learned my sister was going to have a baby. I liked it...a lot. She called me in England to tell me when Naomi was born. I was a missionary. I wept over my absence. I wept over Naomi's presence.

I wrote this poem while Aubrey was still expecting Naomi, and sent a copy to her and my Mom along with the framed photo for Christmas.

It isn't titled. Only dated: "Started Oct 97"

Those fingers have woven my hair and hers

Over and under, they swift become lures

Pulling us in for the wiping of tears

Letting us go with the coming of years

Motherhood spills from her heart and her hands

Into her daughter, now waiting she plans

For in your days of youth and mirth

to blessed daughters you have both given birth

I see you both now as women and friends

Yet childhood visions my memory lends

Blonde hair and blue eyes, bare feet and bare knees

We conquered backyards, sailed living room seas

Now you are mothers, I wait for my turn

Unsure of my future, of what I must learn

Yet like a child, I often am scared

Ever I'm worried I'll not be prepared

We have all three been student and teacher

Taken our turn as listener and preacher

Your mothering sermons fall not on deaf ears

You are gently, with love, allaying my fears

___

Twelve years on I have joined them in the bearing of children. Joined them three times over. I have wept the bitterest tears over my greatest despairs to these two women. My fear of those dark days when I am truly unfit to be a mother. They pick me up every time, casting out the notion that there is any other path equal to this one.

There is a line of mothers behind me, the women who have each borne Eve's pain until I am here to bear it myself. The true pain of motherhood comes after our bodies are broken by the entrance of life. And were it not for my sororal progenitors, namely the one I call Mom, and those truly sister to me, the pain of motherhood would break my soul. But they keep me whole. And with them, I learn that in light of Lehi's opposites, this pain is merely the footpath to life's most profound joys.

And I can't make that rhyme.

So I'm sticking with prose.