Motherhood is a matter of making room
for children and the stuff they cart
from the deep heart of chaos.
An elusive disappearing state,
not immobile enough to grasp
the quiddities of its eel-like essence.
Children, responsible for the advent
of motherhood, cry, break, tear, stain,
whine, kick, wreck and lose things.
Mothers, daily seeking surcease,
try using reason to explain
beauty and order to children.
Children, canny as crows, pretend
to hear their mothers, their deafness
gaining inordinate attention.
Yet mothers persist. Deputized by fate,
they put things to rights everyday,
clean up, and muse on robots.
Some of them even turn quirky,
hear delphic words in the woodwork,
clutches of crones chanting in trees:
“Dig a ditch. Build a tower. Run for cover.
Do something. If you see an out,
grab it. Stop fighting the inevitable.
Let those who want to mother, mother.
Bequeath them the mess children
are said to bless. But take to the sky.”
Few fly. Making their nightly round
from child to child to child to child
breathing sweet, most mother on.
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