Unedited Ragey Poem: Matrescence

Birthing yourself as a mother

Is unfolding into sweet pain

You hurt so they won’t oh please so they won’t

The sharp throbbing ache of staying awake long past

Exhaustion

Long past needing

Bursting through the midnights into dawns a little too bright and orange and smelling of hyacinths

Where physical endurance is no longer relevant

Because enduring is something you actively did

Or held your breath until it subsided

But in this new world there’s just continued breathing

And tired joyful hungry still thirsty worried scared happy protective bored antsy too bright too busy too dark itchy ouchy too loud too silent too too too and not enough can stab you and slice you and wound you but can’t touch the core of you and you’ll continue to exist like it’s a superpower

You’re reduced to a puddle of bubbling lava

And rebuilt slowly, agonizingly

Over the course of a year

Into a gasping forested mountain so alive

That constantly leaks

Love

Compassion

Tears

Milk

I’m so often scared of the syrupy sting of the leaking

And yet

It tempers the burning


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