This Beginning of Miracles
Daily, my children come scraped and howling:
Blood brimming lavishly in their magnificent
Fear. And there I am at my best: cocooning them
In my calm, my words water and honey on their skin.
Panic, that luxury renounced at childbirth,
Finds no place in me.
...........
I keep losing moments,
Days snatched into the jaws of weeks,
Small limbs lengthened,
.............
Bloodstains can be whitened, .........
The soul transformed, the water into wine?
Yet what myopic weakling ....
Looks back longingly at water, when good wine is ahead?
.................
................ As soon mourn birth, or flight;
As soon regret the sunrise. As soon mourn the raw skin,
Healed. And yet it feels like loss, seeing it—
These spreading spirits, their oblivious unfurling,
Stepping delicately from their broken shells:
Filling their lungs, turning their faces up,
..............
—Marilyn Nielson
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I'd like to post the entire poem here but probably shouldn't because of copyright. Let me know if you'd like to see more. This poem brought many thoughts to my heart and mind.
The fear children have when they are hurt – and the role of a parents to “cocoon” them with calmness - this is an awesome stewardship. She says a parent gives up the “luxury” of panic at childbirth. So true – or at least you can’t let the child see your panic.
“I keep losing moments, days snatched into the jaws of weeks…” Childhood does go so very quickly. Old people who tell young people that children grow up quickly are right.
Whitened bloodstains, water into wine, healing. All of this is progress, yet sometimes the changes feel like loss even when we know they aren’t.
Spreading spirits, unfurling, stepping out of their hurts, filing their lungs and looking up - Each child is a miracle. How blessed we are as parents to be part of that miracle.
***********
BYU Studies Quarterly 51, no 4 (2012); 119
Picture of Holton family - Christmas 1955.
Susan & Julia are wearing felt poodle skirts
made by Mildred Floyd
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