It was on a Friday they told me you were dead.

And Daddy was away
And didn't know to come right away
And my friend gave me lilies
Because what was there to say?

For a week I carried you
Still, heavy, silent
A breathing tomb.

I birthed you on Good Friday morning
Held you in the hollow of my hand
Tiny, formed, delicate, alabaster -

David.

My baby
Who lived in my hope
But died in my body
Who lived in my heart
But never in my arms

They told us we could bury you
So we did
In our own soil
Paper shroud, shoebox coffin
Mommy's letter in a bottle.

I planted a lilac to remember you by.

Time passed
We moved away
I had to leave you and the letter and the lilac behind.

Still I am moving away
Leaving you and the letter and the lilac behind.

All those days we talked about our endless dreams
Where worlds lit up and rainbows never die
We'd talk for hours, cause that's what best friends do
We love, live and grow together as one

We fight each other, challenge each other
Never as much as we would fight for each other
We'd talk for hours, cause that's what best friends do
Come rain or sunshine, we'll stand together as one

Through high school dramas and mid-life crises
We found that balance to beat the odds
We'd talk for hours, cause that's what best friends do
Even on our darkest days, we got through it as one

I'm lucky I found my best friend in my mum
I'm truly the luckiest one!

Bad birth, Birthed a ******* baby
Born bad, born to be betrayed
Baggage badly backhanded beaten brutally
Born to be bullied, Before breathing beauty
Born to be bashed
A Barrier bouncing barbarian
Black blocks block beautiful behavior
Boiling beauty turns to a brutal beast  
Blocked brain banned from being the best
A bitter beast born bad bonded behind bigotry
Bombarded brain brutally beaten before birth

The artist paints yellow, pink, and red
roses on her canvas,
glints of blue at the edges
dripping and spilling.
Something for spring, she says.
She gently smiles,
her hand rubbing
the swelling curve
of her belly,
just a black shirt and ragged blue jeans
covering another kind of canvas.
Underneath
something else entirely
waits to bloom.

Clothes, not bluer than your soul.
Soul, as blurry as your eyes.
Fears…
Worries…
About your child…
Son…
As innocent as snow…
In the earliest morrow…

Sighs…

How much did you wipe today
With a big piece of your heart,
Through the challenges of his life…?

How much did you whip today
With long echoes from the past
Your scared back with more remorse…?

How much did you add today
From the pure drops of your love
When you early warmed his meal
Raising him healthy and strong…?

How much did you think last night,
Of the events of his day,
And the games he used to play
Of the quarrels with his friend,
And the absence of his dad...?

What will he do to survive…?
Will he be happy and fine?
Will he smile and learn and thrive?
Know what to do with his life?
Could you worry even more?

How much did you safe today?
How much did you self-deprive?
How much did you sleep at night,
Since you’re working all time?
Is something left for yourself?
How are you dealing with pain?

*Angles of all heavens..
Flowers of all gardens..
Jewels of all shops…
All goodness in all lives…
Don’t come even close to
Offsetting sacrifice
Of Motherhood!

My whole little world sat down on a blanket.
Cushion of grass below.

Happy gaze of their mother had not sank yet.
Feeling the breeze that blows.

Favorite snacks all packed, arrang'd just so.
Smiling eyes excitement.

Small hints of growth, faces are quite chang'd though.
My sweet enlightenment.

Heavy burdens and sorrow bravely carries
Good Mothers do.

Shelter this innocence as it tarries
Showing love true.

Heartstrings so delicate needing tender care
Never to abuse.

Forever I wish to stay there, as then their
Smiling muse

When my grandmother dies,
I hope they fill her casket with flowers.
So that the last time we see her,
she is nestled in amongst
the delicate feathered petals of mountain bluet
haloed by the bright yellow of birdsfoot
the length
of her soft
decaying body
is caressed by the long stalks of bottle brush
and bog candle
so that we can imagine her,
splayed out in a warm field
on the outskirts of St Johns
laughing in the sunlight
the weight
of such a long life,
of mothering so many children,
melting away
into the warm red soil.

I hope the service
is held in a small white church
with all the windows thrown open;
the clear air and the sunlight
tumbling down onto our heads,
onto her lightly clasped hands,
onto her soft  lips...

I hope they read poems for her
play light happy songs for her
I hope
everyone remembers to tell her
they love her.
I will ask,
that they bury her somewhere
with a good view of the stars,
lay her to rest where the wind
blows the smell of the ocean over her,
and she can admire the sunrise
under the arms of a gentle Alder.

I hope we remember
that she has loved
so deeply
that she has laughed
and lost
and been so unbearably human
all of her life
even when she has been quiet
even as she has cared for us.

I hope we remember
what a resilient woman she is
but also how tender.
How new she once was,
to love
and to it’s touch.

And when I
am someone’s grandmother
I hope they remember
that even I,
was once somebody’s lover.

Minutes of pregnancy
Siouxsie can't placate me
I'm wandering in the darkness...
in the underbelly of life
scared of my own body,
now I understand the strife...the fear inside

I didn't fear it
but it is here!
I could laugh at it
until I see it coming straight at me...
and nothing is fun anymore

"I'll be the pregnant punk girl at class,
Another brick in my strange life.
I'll be worrying until I see what's up"

Minutes of pregnancy,
minutes in hell.
It was the darkest shade,
that I would be a mother,
so much shame over me,
the little girl that got eaten by the wolves and her worms,
the worms of her cobwebs, long, long cobwebs.
I know I am a hysterical child,
moved only by my own terrors.
What will I do? I ask, worried, to anyone who wants to hear me.

Will you be with me?
Will you hold my hand?
Or leave me there to bleed?
Is mom right about this?

My most feared performance...