Mother's Day Poem

Life in the after
for Beth on Mother’s Day 5/14/06
by Kevin Cahill

birth is just how
it ends
together
one flesh inside
another
swaddled in amniotic
luxury
an ocean of good
feeling
the shore but a
rumor
and then you
see
the prickly dark
spot
tree-lined and
beyond
the rounded hills
hiding
places where the new
born
will one day
run
be secret the way
you did
before the birth of your
child
after you left your
mother
to be born again
to be
heavy to swell like
the sea
these longings cast you
out
there on rounded
waves
only a mother knows this
current
and what it means
to be
borne away and live
after.