Mothering Me, Mothering You
It was sound
and smell
that brought you back.
They weren’t pleasant,
like inhaling your perfume
in the crevice of your neck
when you’d pull me down
for a warm hug.
Or the sound of your breathless laughter,
from across the house.
As I lay in labor,
it was the stench of rancid urine that soaked through the sheets
and the monitors beeping erratically
around me.
I was at the same hospital,
you took your last breath,
a year before.
I was in hell.
The pain in my back was unbearable.
Relief failed me,
again and again.
The ground seemed to give way beneath me.
And everyone around me wore practiced smiles,
like soulless medical bots,
saying, “This will be quite the story to tell one day.”
When relief failed,
I needed you there.
When everything beneath me broke,
I needed you there.
When my back couldn’t support me anymore,
I needed you there.
Bedridden, immobile,
writhing in pain.
I wanted you to reassure me,
in your Witchy ways.
To hold my hand as you did,
with your fingers wrapped in mine,
and squeeze it three times,
as you would.
You used to call me “mother,”
sometimes.
When MS kept you from
walking,
peeing,
showering
on your own.
You would say it
when I wiped you
after the toilet
or got you dressed after the shower.
I wasn’t sure if you were confused at the time,
as MS often made you,
or if it was genuinely how you felt,
that I was a mother figure to you now.
It upset me at first
because I just wanted
You
to be my Mom.
But you were, and I guess in some ways,
so was I,
to you.
One day,
As I pulled your socks
up over your swollen ankles,
one foot at a time,
and replaced your diaper
with a fresh new lavender Depends,
you looked down at me
smiled
and said,
“You are going to be a great mother one day.”
There is a lullaby the hospital plays,
over the loudspeaker,
every time a baby is born.
It is tradition for new parents to press a button
that instantly plays the song and announces their newborn to the world.
I remember we heard it every day you were in the ICU.
Every day we heard it,
it re-instilled our faith.
A momentary glimmer of hope amidst the backdrop of chaos and heartbreak.
The lullaby haunted me for months to come,
punctuating
life
and
death,
facing us
head-on.
I would hear it in the middle of the night,
softly playing in the background.
Reminding me of you.
Reminding me of birth.
Bringing peace.
Bringing fear.
I pressed the lullaby button
as we left labor and delivery,
with your granddaughter.
Our beautiful baby girl.
Overcome with elation, with sadness.
My daughter was finally here,
and everyone in the world should know.
But you weren’t,
and everyone in the world should know.
I know you would have smiled from your hospital bed,
as you did when you heard the lullaby play for the babies born before her.
You would have smiled despite the breathing apertures connected to your mouth, lips,
and nose.
You would have smiled through your bright blue eyes, reassuring me it would all be
okay.
You would have taken my hand,
entangled it in yours,
and squeezed it three times.
Maybe you knew that when she was born, so was I.
Into the mother I’ve always wanted to be.
Into the “great mother,” you knew I’d be.
- JourMS - 