The next six chapters each offer alternations between poetry and prose, arranged thematically as follows: Chapter 4, "Report from the Trenches," is a window into the experience of motherhood, from the mourning of miscarriage to the celebration of birth, from the stresses and demands of raising young children to the grappling with illness to the emergence of adolescence. A particular focus is on women's spiritual transformation through the experience of mothering.
The haze of those early newborn days ... the ecstasy of holding, touching, kissing ... the mind-numbing blur of exhaustion ... the terror of total and permanent responsibility. I remember how for the first few weeks I was afraid to be left alone in the house with "her". We lived right off campus; a student came a few hours a day to help with the laundry, to straighten up the kitchen. At least that's what I told her I was paying her for. Her real function was simply to be a physical presence in the house, to somehow shore up my courage in learning to care for a totally helpless creature who might at any moment demand something vital I would prove too incompetent to provide ... How long did it take until I felt at ease being alone with my own baby? A long time...
Slowly they grow, you learn, they help you to relax, to forget your fear. Eventually you see that you're going to be OK. Life settles into a routine. If you're lucky, your baby naps.
Do you flush? When she's napping--
Do you flush?
No, I say to the voice on the other end of the phone.
We both laugh.
Another mother's secret shared.
When I put her down
I take the phone off the hook,
wrap the receiver in a dish towel,
and then stick it in my purse.
I take off my shoes
and tiptoe around in my socks,
gathering books, magazines, sections of the newspaper,
something to nosh, pen, writing paper,
my latest quilting project--
enough to sustain me for days, weeks.
I tiptoe it all into the living room
and then I sit.
Sometimes I ignore it all,
immediately asleep myself.
Or I stare out the window,
let my mind wander,
accountable to no one.
Most often, with exquisite luxury,
I choose a book, the sewing, perhaps Sunday's magazine section.
And of course I only risk going to the bathroom--
and passing her door--
if my bladder is so full I can't concentrate any more.
But then the neighbor's dogs go crazy,
or the parcel postman rings the bell
(it's never for me, always for one of the women on the block
who works all day)
and then I hear her.
The break is over
I'm a mother again.
Up the stairs
open the door
I fling my arms out wide
and we embrace like sentimental old Italians.
I kiss all the flesh I can get my mouth to--
her neck
her cheeks
her nose
her eyes
I babble love nonsense to her
and she in turn strokes my face.
I thought those days would never end.