MOTHERHOOD NOTES Nº 1 - SMALL APERTURES

I have longed for time on my own, but now he's not there, there is no

longer that longing. Just a hole, and inside it, what feels like a silent echo.

On my computer screen hovers a spinning rainbow, opposes work.

I make a cup of tea and try to capture the moment, just as it is.

And time does stretch out, like a lazy cat, striped crosswise. A fire truck drives

past outside and the sirens cut like a sharp blade through the dull thunder.

Somewhere there's a fire inside the rain, I think to myself.

The tea turns cold while I await time.

We haven't left the house in time for anything since he was born 

but today I rush out, lock the door without abiding time at all.

She can catch up with me as best she can down the street.

Soaked wet with rain I meet a photographer in the nursery hallway.

He has photographed all the kids today, he says.

I don't know how he knows whose mother I am. 

Maybe I tell him, but I'm too blurred to know for sure.

Cassius.. he mumbles and searches his big camera LCD screen,

finding his way to the image he's looking for.

Rain or wind carried seawater drips salt from my brow,

trickles down my cheek and I stick the tip of my tongue out a corner

to meet it. The photographer angles the camera to show me.

And there he is, sitting on the floor, looking up and into the camera,

into me. His little body in a knitted cardigan, with his ears a bit protruding,

and with syrupy, dark eyes. His mouth is open and his glance too.

The hollow in me echoes as from a distant and tiny, fragile bell.

He's gorgeous..! smiles the photographer and holds my gaze.

I feel matt, but my eyes must be glassy.

A painter helps me carry the stroller and son down the stairs.

Suddenly it has stopped raining and the sun shoots silvery, clear spears

down into the sea, through the milky white. And that's how it is,

that little celestial body in a knitted cardigan is my aperture.

He is an opening in himself, to the world. Through him,

I more often now glimpse an abyss whose sombre depth turn me faint.

And yet, over the whole, there hovers an extraordinary tenderness.

☾

cassius is wearing the daily pullover {in mushroom} by millk