The living white rug has worn
more stains than needed;
we sat there ancient thieves
ducking heads and rolling on our backs,
your feet on my chest.
For a moment, I felt grass beneath me -
lingering smells of summer,
my nose a season behind.
I knew I wouldn't have to search long.
I'm a mother again.
Now, you sleep,
fabrics of rug cradling you
like the earth we search for.
You call me mother between breaths
though my body didn't shape you
J.R.Bouchard has forthcoming poetry in The Mad Poets Review, and has been featured in The Promethean --
a literary journal for Concordia University, where she received her B.A. She is originally from Troy, New
York but recently moved to Philadelphia for an M.F.A. program. She's currently a nanny for an 8-year-old.
| I recently started writing a series of poems about motherhood, and my experiences as a nanny. I wrote Womb Heavy to explore how my own desires to be a mother often haunt me. I become a mother-figure, yet I feel equally detached. Equally disappointing is knowing the children I work with will not remember these moments, the moments most precious to me because they are too young. Womb Heavy is really an echoed longing, and a burden/emotional weight at the same. |
