Poetry - Sheepshead Review - 33
How to be a Mother
Mary Mattson
At 9 p.m. realize that the pressure is no longer a kicking from within but a squeezing you cannot control tell your mother contractions and she will drive you, her sixteen-year-old baby to the hospital to have her first grand-baby swallow down your heart as it climbs up your throat. smile at your mother, don’t think about what you are too young to keep At 9:45 submit to the wheelchair even though you’d rather walk feel the rhythmic “click, click, click,” as the wheels run over hospital tiles, “tick, tick, tick,” counting down to when you will be empty
34 - Sheepshead Review - Poetry
lie in the unnaturally crisp white bed, feel relieved when the nurse says only 2 centimeters dilated place your hands on your round stretched out belly. look up at your mother, think of your daughter… redirect your thoughts to adoptive parents who are not sixteen take your mother’s hand when she reaches for you see her eyes blink back oceans, decide not to cry At 10:25 and 3 cm watch the twin lines of spiking heartbeats, yours and your daughter’s, on the screen attached to cords, attached to straps around your belly, your chest wonder if she will look like you or her father kiss your grandmother when she relieves your mother for a while think that now she will be a great-grandmother close your eyes, let her stroke your tired forehead forget to smile, but do not cry listen to the florescent lights hum, try to sleep At 1 a.m. and 5 cm wake up from dreams of swimming hear voices in your room, greet the adoptive parents who are not sixteen, and not in high school look into their eyes and hate them just a little because they will keep what you cannot love them more for the same reason hug the adoptive father in the absence of your own father, and your daughter’s
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spend the next five hours pacing, lying down, sitting up infinitely uncomfortable when your big brother visits at bar close, don’t cry when he calls you babe At 6 a.m. and 7 cm fall asleep between contractions dream your daughter’s whole life in the 2 and a half minutes before the next At 7:30 and 9 cm DO NOT PUSH put your sixteen-year-old hands against your mother’s forty-six-year-old hands, palm to palm, push there instead. Decide not to cry, feel tears etching loss down your flushed cheeks do not think of the adoptive parents who are not sixteen, and not in high school, and not terrified of motherhood At 8:08 and 10 cm feel your mother’s hand on one heel a nurse’s hand on the other feel the light above you, a spotlight, make an island of the white bed and your sixteen-year-old body
How to be a Mother - Mary Mattson
36 - Sheepshead Review - Poetry
in dark waters surrounding you, see dimly grandmother holding adoptive mother watery eyed, refusing to look away, determined to share your pain your daughter nowPUSH feel your daughter become another’s as she leaves your island for dark waters At 8:22 when the nurse asks who to give your daughter to, say to her mother point a shaky, anemic finger at the shaky, adoptive mother watch her hand cover her mouth, before she steps forward to hold what you cannot see her fall in love, like you did invite the adoptive father in, in the absence of your own, give your daughter her own father At 9 a.m. in the hospital bathroom stand unsteady in front of mirror see your daughter’s face in your reflection and cry until your head throbs and your heart aches wrap your arms around your empty self hear your mother in the doorway-
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let her take you in her arms, think that now she is a grandmother, wonder if you are still a mother stand in the hospital room on feet made steady by four generations of mothers look at the daughter who is no longer yours look at the baby in your arms, with your lips, and your nose, and another’s eyes hold her out to the father and mother, and love them for keeping what you cannot.
How to be a Mother - Mary Mattson