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| My daughter & a flock of Laughing Gulls |
"The important thing in life is to let the years carry us along." Federico Garcia Lorca, Yerma"
This evening I press my ear to your chest,
hear the ocean's waves and laughing gulls
that reside inside, distant laughter of children
you've made fast friends, your voice
calling "Mother, come look!"
Close my eyes, see you walk a mermaid's path,
white frothy sea foam and iridescent bubbles
slowly fade and pop as morning's surf recedes,
tears glistening as you mourn their death.
Wrap myself around you, whelk like,
my shell far too fragile for true protection.
Realize tears are as important as laughter
yet my heart bangs along the shore,
chipped and worn, fighting for a journey
resembling my dreams perhaps more than yours.
And there's the fissure as you turn
and take the covers with you surely as decisively
as the tide reclaims what is hers. Always.
So, I settle upon the porch, chastised a bit,
yet revel in the sounds I've heard,
know you are alive and growing,
tumbling along life's shoreline
beneath the laughing gulls.
by Margaret Bednar, March 29, 2018
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| Walking the Mermaid Path - When Mermaids die, legend has it they turn to sea foam |
This poem uses an example of one child, but truly this poem embraces both my 10 year old son and 23 year old daughter - we just got back from Isle of Palms, SC (a hop skip and jump from historic Charleston).
My poem has nothing to do with the play "Yerma" which is a "tragic poem" telling the story of a childless woman living in rural Spain. Her desperate desire for motherhood becomes an obsession. This is all in Spanish (which I don't speak) but I posted it here as I am going to watch it this weekend.
14 comments:
All I know is those final two stanzas gave me a bittersweet pang in my heart. I loved this. And I never knew that about mermaids and the froth.
Wrap myself around you, whelk like,
my shell far too fragile for true protection...
This goes to the heart of motherhood!
Such a beautiful write!! And I loved the pics of your daughter on the shore, beneath the laughing gulls.
There are such wonderful sounds in this poem, Margaret, and I love the images in the lines:
'white frothy sea foam and iridescent bubbles
slowly fade and pop as morning's surf recedes'
and
'Wrap myself around you, whelk like,
my shell far too fragile for true protection'.
The poignancy of motherhood, knowing our protection is fragile of those beloved children. I loved the listening to the shore and laughing gulls in her chest.........and the vision of her walking among the bubbles like a mermaid. So beautiful!
This was so touching to me as a mother. I thought of all the worlds and magic that exist in my children, and smiled.
momentous in the way your poem moves through the lines and even more so for the feelings that ebb and flo - this is one of those 'wish I'd written this' poems Margaret
Oh my. Wrapping oneself whelk-like...Really lovely. I don't have children so...but I can relate to those I love. Gorgeous in the love.
Love those laughing gulls, oh for the life, laugh all day as they fish. I don't think our eight-year-old knows either, about the sea froth, but she loves mermaides. She has invented a swim stroke she calls "The Mermaid."
..
The gentleness and naturalness of this peach births all sorts of smiles...
The wrapping whelklike and all the imagery of sea is perfect for motherhood...
This made me cry. I feel it in my bones.
Aah...life...the most precious gift of all. When I read ...."know you are alive and growing,
tumbling along life's shoreline"....tears sprung up in my eyes. i' m a mum of 4....so..well...I think you know the rest. :) :)
'Wrap myself around you like a whelk' - beautiful imagery in this, as in the rest of this wonderful poem.
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