Emily Adams-Aucoin | Motherhood Ghazal
Motherhood is priced Of God, at price no man may dare To lessen or misunderstand.
Helen Hunt Jackson
I become a jagged new planet in this motherhood,
entering rooms I did not know of before motherhood.
even milk-stained, on our knees praying to our parents’ gods,
there is some mysterious gravity to motherhood.
I’ve wanted to disappear into that violet sky.
my daughter tied me to the world, gifted me motherhood.
there are blueberries crushed in the carpet from yesterday;
the gardens are lush in the center of my motherhood.
you can never return fully to what you were before
the riverbed eroded, thinned by your motherhood.
in March, my heart learns to walk outside of my empty chest.
I clap & coo, as is customary in motherhood.
I think it’s true that the laughter of it sounds like a song.
I orbit grief & joy, circumbinary motherhood.
dappled in morning sunlight, rosy-cheeked & full-bellied,
they’ll still name you for the darkest hours of motherhood.
Helen Hunt Jackson
I become a jagged new planet in this motherhood,
entering rooms I did not know of before motherhood.
even milk-stained, on our knees praying to our parents’ gods,
there is some mysterious gravity to motherhood.
I’ve wanted to disappear into that violet sky.
my daughter tied me to the world, gifted me motherhood.
there are blueberries crushed in the carpet from yesterday;
the gardens are lush in the center of my motherhood.
you can never return fully to what you were before
the riverbed eroded, thinned by your motherhood.
in March, my heart learns to walk outside of my empty chest.
I clap & coo, as is customary in motherhood.
I think it’s true that the laughter of it sounds like a song.
I orbit grief & joy, circumbinary motherhood.
dappled in morning sunlight, rosy-cheeked & full-bellied,
they’ll still name you for the darkest hours of motherhood.
Emily Adams-Aucoin is a poet from Upstate New York. Her work has been published in various anthologies, as well as in Electric Literature’s “The Commuter,” storySouth, Split Rock Review, Meridian, and Colorado Review, among other publications. You can find Emily on Twitter and Instagram @emilyapoetry, as well as her website www.emilyadamsaucoin.com.