My arms grew long
In the days of new motherhood.
Grotesque and skinny
Like a Tim Burton caricature;
Funny, some say.
Long and lank --
Eyes black and blank --
From hapless sleep,
A lapless freak,
With long, long arms
Toting all things Baby ...
MY baby! MY baby!
I clutched my cheerful
All-purpose tote made by a
Designer with a bottomless
Pit of pickles somewhere close,
Hastening lazy silkworms to
Design something that might
Keep it all interesting,
Organized maybe.
(Or at the very east, keep it pretty.)
Diapersdiapersdiapers!
And wipes for sensitive skin,
Acres and acres of lunches and snacks
In smart packages of plastic excess
(Stamped Organic, so it'll do.)
Specialty seats and bibs and
Bottles and scratchy blankets,
And pacifiers ranging in size and
Color and form, and those
Just-in-Case items, like, say, the
UC Berkeley Medical School of Sterilization
(Because one just never knew.)
These things I folded up in freshly bent
Purple pipe cleaner arms, with
Elongated biceps and shoulders --
That could never again
Be bent anew; crooked a bit for always.
The merciless pulling on tendons and
Cartilage and unborn muscles
Made my arms grow long,
(They never have gotten back to right.)
Made my heart grow strong.
The heart is a muscle, too, they say.
The reset of me?
Fat with happy, happy,
And beautiful baby.
For my beautiful Emma Talya
May 31, 2013
Walnut Creek, CA
YOU ARE READING
Long are My Arms
PoesieA poem I wrote about the time when I had a kindergartener and a newborn, around 2004-2005. It was a beautiful time of my life. It was written in May of 2013 during a time of reflection.
