Guest post at Vision and Verb: On becoming a gramma

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James 6 months ago, at about 12 hours old

Today I am sneaking out of hibernation to write a guest post at the lovely Vision and Verb (. . . a global gathering of women of this age). My sister Ginnie, a collaborator at V&V (and at her own photoblog Heart & Soul and blog In Soul), asked me to write about being a gramma. I am honored to join the women who write there, but what a challenge it is to gather in my feelings and set them down. Well, here goes. (Oh, and he is 6 months old today.)

Get everything finished beforehand, because it will be some time before you get anything “important” done again.  Keep reading . . . 

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How to read a poem

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It's the middle of National Poetry Month, time to pause for a lesson. Believe it or not, my grandson is nearly three months old. He's a good teacher, and I should not keep his lessons to myself.

How to read a poem

Take him in your lap.

Look deep into his dark eyes.

Watch his arms while they

loop orbits in space

for no apparent purpose.

Let him ride his invisible

bicycle somewhere far—pumping,

pumping, pumping tiny legs,

making your thighs tremble.

See how still his eyes remain.

Fossick the meaning in his fists

where unknown words

are hidden and twirled.

(Don’t worry about the meaning

of those incomprehensible words now.

You can look for them later, together.)

He is telling you something

of where he has so recently been,

where you are desperately

trying to go in your perfectly

silent and heavy red chair.

He is showing you every truth

he has ever known

in a very small package.

When at last he smiles

in the otherwise motionless

residue following the flailings of his body,

you will understand what he means.

April 2012

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Song for James, who got his first vaccines at 2 months yesterday

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Spring children
(a riddle, sort of)

The ground is old in the farmyard

and on it my feet stomp;

but never can I break it,

no one tells me not to romp!

But there are children who play here

who come back every spring

and break through the ground like sunlight

so it doesn’t feel the sting!
 

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Poem: A birth, and a death

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A birth, and a death

for Lister Matheson

No snow, and little
to speak of this warm winter;
ochre moss in laced stars
below small knobs of dried, dun
prairie fleabane,

planetary in death,
trembling in the circle of wind.

O my friend you are dead
and traveling
even while all for me is reborn

long before spring
in this non-winter of brown nothing
that is even so

beautiful, from the trodden meadow path
to the slim trees grown tall,
black, and sunlit by morning's horizon.

January 2012

Poetry should be heard.

Postscript: This small poem should be considered a momentary and brief snapshot in a series of poetic responses in these early days of my grandson's life. It cannot suffice as a fitting tribute or memorial to Lister, whose expanse of life, work and persona would need several volumes of momentary—and epic—responses. My thanks to Brendan for his comments, which helped me to realize that I needed to say this here in the post.

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poem: little tree

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little tree

for my newborn grandson, James

(I cannot speak this directly to him.
It must be in the second person.
What would happen if I told him what is here?

I am not ready to break anything
that is not yet broken open.
The world has just begun.)

His head is in my hands, mouth open,
eyes half-stupored. He is breathing me,
as if I am winter, to warm in his mouth.
He exhales me back to me.
My voice is a silver blue bead he fingers
with a perfect tongue.

He has not learned to forget
that the earth always has her mouth open,
holding the sea and not swallowing,
nesting the trees for their nesting birds,
breathing the sky and not throwing anything away.


January 2012

Poetry should be heard. Perhaps listen to me read while playing a song for Egon Schiele, below.

Painting "Little Tree (Chestnut Tree at Lake Constance)" by Egon Schiele

Listen to Rachel's song Egon & Gertie. . . .

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My new life

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I type this with one finger while James sleeps on my chest. We are at home in his apartment on his fifth day of life, with his mommy and daddy. Daddy goes back to teaching today. Mommy will have a visit from a nurse to check in.

I have been living in the organic multi-day emergence of a new human being. In some ways it is a blur of minutes, hours and days, without clear delineation of what happened when. Yet we are constantly counting, in the way of civilized humans. The number of hours in labor, of hours pushing, inventory of fingers and toes, how many minutes at the breast, how many poos and pees in 24 hours. Time with its quantities is our way of measuring health and wellbeing, and with the major systems of eating and digestion well established, and my daughter’s healing underway, we ease into the stream and rippling flow of the journey.

All this amid the unspeakable wonder of exquisitely intense intimacy. The now-ness of every second. His phenomenal beauty of face and body. His peaceful countenance. His downy and fragrant temple against my lips. The whisper of his breath, the snuffles and squeaks of his voice, and the quiet smacks of his lips. I have plenty of photos to take with me today when I leave him for home and work. But the feel of his weight on my chest, the sounds of his breath and sighing voice, the scent of his warm head—these will be swaddled in the memory of my senses for a few days, until I snuggle with him again.

I am saturated and unsatiated in love. Yet there is a growing awareness that time and work call me back to their necessities. Just as James will grow past these first days of utter dependence—so beautiful and desirable to me now—I, too, will grow into my life, with new tendrils sprouting from the grafted stem.

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Announcing: my first grandchild

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name: James Lawrence

born: January 18, 2012 (his due date)
Time: 11:17pm

labor: 22 1/2 hours

health: excellent

weight: 6 lbs. 11 oz.

length: 18 inches

energy/personality: still, gentle, graceful

parents: strong, exhausted, besotted

grammy: in love, speechless, listening