SIX WEEKS

the changes leave me
gobsmacked

baby shouldered
and wibbling,

froth at the corner
of his cupid's-bow mouth

stretch marks
like a tiger-print tattoo

marking my belly
fertile

days distilled simple:
nurse, diaper, repeat

some day soon
you'll smile

and these sundered nights
will be redeemed

This week's readwritepoem prompt is a word cloud, from which I took the words sundered, shouldered, fertile, froth, simple. These are the words which leapt out at me as soon as I looked at the cloud. Following my mentor Jason Shinder's mantrum "whatever gets in the way of the work, is the work," I know that right now my best poems (okay, who am I kidding: my only poems) are going to be motherhood poems. The experience of parenting a newborn is so overwhelming, so relentless, that there isn't room for much else in my brain. So I chose words which fit the mold into which my life already feels poured.

To see what other RWP'ers did with the same prompt, check out this week's get your poem on post. And I want to offer thanks to the RWP community for coming here and leaving comments on my poems even though I'm not able to reciprocate right now. Someday, my friends with kids assure me, I'll have more space & time for my literary life again -- I look forward to being a better conversation partner then!

[sixweeks.mp3]

By the by, I've created a new category on this blog: mother poems. Poems which fit this bill will be filed both under the "poetry" category and under this more precise "mother poems" category, so if you're ever looking to read all of the motherhood poems I've posted, now you can.