A Minute Longer

If I could, I’d like a minute longer.  I know you have to go but it’s taken me all night to get here.  All fucking night to end up, shoes off, next to you on this couch.  Please, I might just need a few minutes longer yet. 

I’ve spent all night navigating this and, if I could, I’d like a minute longer to play this out.  It doesn’t usually take me this long but, as you might see, I’m distracted.  You have, at the very least, noticed this behind my eyes. 

I’m distracted by the hand you placed on my arm when you laughed.  It does work! So very distracted by your eyes, hair, and the curve of your hips.  I’m high and in my head.  You look over, check in, and we carry on again.  I’m spinning inside whist trying to play this out.  How the fuck does this play out?

I stand, casually, as casually as I can muster, and kick my shoes off.  Is she looking?  Toss my shirt onto the chair.  Casual.  Ever so casual.  Is she looking?  Slip out of my pants, placing them tidy, ever so tidy, on the chair.  Slid my panties down my hips, bend at the waist.  Is she looking now?

I slip into the water, I’m a strong swimmer but these waters are muddy.  I lean on the edge, something I never do.  Strong swimmers dunk and start, they don’t hang onto the edge.  But, tonight, I cling, thinking through the strokes, the breaths that I might need to take.  I can’t navigate this either.  I’m high and in my head.

The night is wrapping up.  I know it is, but I smoke joint after joint, diving further into my head, deeper into these muddied waters.  I’m feeling rushed watching you put your shoes on.  I want to tell you that I’m close, close to figuring it out.  But I need a minute. 

So, if I could, I’d like just a minute longer to explore why I’d like a minute longer with you.

Kitchen Miracles

I felt her in my kitchen last night.  I might even go as far as to argue with you and say that I saw her too.  I saw her only enough that I called out for her to try to confirm was my eyes were telling me. So, I called out and no one called back to me.  No one called back to me, but an overcoming sense of love washed over me in the absence of sound.  My voice drifted through the kitchen and around the corner, and the only reply was love.

And that’s enough for me.

It’s enough for me to think I saw a tiny head peeking around the corner in the middle of the night as I washed the dishes, listened to music, and danced.  I washed the dishes, listened to music, and danced in my kitchen last night because no one was there to see it. 

No one was there to see it, except her.

She saw it and I can’t help but think that she understands it.  She understands why mom choose to stay up late, while most of the chores were done, and do this very last one.  I was told once, while crying that I should use the act of washing the dishes as a meditative sport.  Wash, rinse, repeat. Be intentional and present I was advised.  Feel the warmth of the water and the repetitive movements of my hands.  When I can do those things, perhaps she will come to me.

And she did come to me.

I felt her before I saw her. I turned around thinking I’ll catch someone out of bed. Instead, it was the flash of a small person peeking around the corner and then pulling away.  ‘Hello’ I called out.  No one answered my call.  No one verbally answered my call, but a wash of love filled my soul.  It was her.  She’s watching you, Mama. Watching you wash the dishes, sing, and sway.  She’s watching you be truly present, truly engaged, and truly happy. 

Perhaps miracles can happen when we are truly present, truly engaged, and truly happy. 

12 Years Ago

I held her 12 years ago.

That one one-sided embrace is all I get this lifetime.

I held her 12 years ago, in complete shock.

Is this one-sided embrace all I get this lifetime?

I kissed her 12 years ago.

The tiny kiss planted on extra rosy lips must sustain me forever.

I kissed her 12 years ago, shaking uncontrollably.

Why are her lips that deep shade of red?

I understood love 12 years ago

Holding her, wrapped up and perfect, I knew I’d die for her.

I understood love 12 years ago, and also loss.

Who the fuck do I need to negotiate with to get her back?

I was born a mother 12 years ago.

A childless mother whose arms ached.

She made me a mother 12 years ago, tear-streaked face.

How do I honour her in everything that I do?

I last saw her 12 years ago.

One last stolen moment on a couch in a funeral home.

I feel her in everything I do, and everything I’ve created.

Who would she look like her sister and act like her mama?

!2 years is a long time to be without something, to feel like it might just be around the next bend, slightly out of reach but, 12 years is just the beginning, we are just warming up.

In 12 years, we’ve made hospital changes, started a conversation about stillbirth, held hands with an entire community of people who felt like they were in the dark.  I’ve put it out there, I’ve put you out there, unapologetically. 

We’ve made noise, haven’t we?

Let’s keep making noise - I’ll sing extra loud tonight right before I blow out your candles for you.

Happy 12th birthday, Penelope.

You are loved and never forgotten.

Heaviness

There’s a heaviness that creeps in this time of year.  I don’t even realize it’s heavy until it fully settles on my chest, weighing me down, making it hard to breathe.

I don’t even realize it’s heavy, or stop long enough to feels it’s heaviness, until you ask me, pointedly, how I’m doing.  I know what you are looking for, your question, ‘How are you doing?’ cuts through the bullshit of the day-to-day.  Your question cuts right through me.  So, I breathe.  And, after I breathe, allowing the heaviness to fill me, I tell you about it; I describe it to you, hearing it for the first time this year myself.

If I breathe before I answer, I can feel it all. And, If I sit still for long enough, I remember. 

I remember the pink nightgown I wore the morning you passed.  I was sweeping our apartment at 38 weeks and 2 days.  He made a video of me sweeping that morning and I laughed on camera in my pink nighty.  That nightgown, now folded, sits in a bin with a green maxi dress, and an all-black outfit.  These items, I will never part with, but I will certainly never wear again.  That nighty, worn by a woman I can’t even remember.  I’d never wear that nighty now; I’m a tank-top-and-thong-to-bed girl now.  This pink knee-length nighty represents a woman that I don’t know anymore.  Tucked nicely into a plastic bin it sits, along with my naïveté.

Busting at full-term, I slipped off the nighty and into a green maxi dress, perfect for running errands in late September.  I felt you kick in the parking lot at the Superstore.  I remember that moment, standing in the parking lot, saying hello to you, only because I was asked, later that evening to recall it.  That moment, like so many in the previous months, stopped me for a moment, but wasn’t anything to write home about.  You kicked, I acknowledged, and into the grocery store I went.  It wasn’t until I was asked, ‘When was the last time that you felt her move?’ later at the hospital that the moment became forever engraved into my mind.  That kick, the way I cupped the lower right side of my belly while standing in the parking lot, will never dissolve into the day-to-day. 

You, sweet girl, will never dissolve into the day-to-day.  Try as I might to busy myself every September, the moment I stop to breathe, I feel you, and the moment I steady myself, I remember.

Today, I cry for you.

Tomorrow, I celebrate you.

Every day, Mama loves you.