lemonworld, or, this post's for lauren and her beautiful baby ellie (the birth of small things)

dear friends, today i found some writings from the week before and the month after finn was born. i realized as i was reading them that this blog was born out of those writings. this first long passage i wrote the week before finn was born:

To be a mother: acceptance of a certain death of myself (accept that i will die for love). alice notley says something like "i believe in the debt to nature: sex, children, death."

acceptance of small and big things that i (will) do with the minutes of my life. acceptance (needed) of the very smallest things: dailiness.--to enjoy life even in its lonelinesses. even in its overwhelming fullnesses.

let things surface, like water does. eventually it will float up or be waved to the shore. i was (am)what is called a late bloomer. i understand curling tight until absolute ripeness.--principles of creativity. some things have to fight for survival (the girl's hand on the skull in candlelight). you don't want to be rushed. you're born when you're ready. what is the word for body, mind, instincts, soul, all together? what is the word for the one complete mechanism? is it possible to finish thoughts and not be anxious?

i accept the small things--the just-one-form of the flower.
i accept the small things--without glory, attention, without even a self.
i accept the small things: one step one breath.
i accept the small things: one glimpse of the moon.
i accept the small ways--small motions we must adhere to: feeding a child. one hair on the raspberry that must be plucked.
i accept the small things: one beat, another beat inside that.
the small things: an organism.
i accept what is small: that i must let my life be quiet, too, let it breathe in sound and not constantly take part in the grand scale.
i accept: one inching motion toward part of a poem.
i accept the small way i falter towards full acceptance of myself as a poet, lover, mom, friend, worth-while being. i falter. i accept. (right now). it is small.

there are those things that are small and 'parts',
there are those that are small and whole.
in reality (paradox) it seems all is both.
but we can make a distinction. . .

i accept how small things shall seem at times: me struggling, with air, at the edge of what seems like nothing or irrelevance.

-------and this i wrote a month into real-live-baby motherhood:

of the small things (poem at one month old)

one green lightning bug floating between linden tree's upper branches
neck smell stuck in one corner of one bounce of air
a day in which i am awake and all that i will do, all day, is put tape on a box
and pick up the dropped stem of swiss chard, deep pink, from the kitchen floor
but ignore the butternut squash bit stuck to skin--
parking the car and waiting patiently for the two rabbits to move
so i don't kill them
however the dead gold chrysanthemum head's caught in the web
across the porch--a web abandoned by its spider--
the point of adults is that they shouldn't exist
is the thought that goes on and on in vastness
as blue as a blue sheet of light breathing across the desk

- - - - -

and i want to dedicate this post to lauren, in her first months of mama-hood, and in all the drippy difficulties and overwhelmedness thereof. dear lauren: you are good! also here are some closeups of ellie sleeping, in her beauty--





also, here's what i am grateful for on this day(lemonworld):

1. the national's new record, especially the songs "blood-buzz ohio" and "lemonworld". because. finn and i had our first all-out dance party to those 2 songs, spontaneously, and it made me so happy and it made me remember who i am! i am a person who dances spontaneously and feverishly! literally, this dance party helped me so immensely; sounds silly, but. . .
2. also i am grateful to those 2 songs for another reason. because they give me that feel of falling in love, love-falling, like so excited and everything's going to change and be amazing;; full, dreadful, painful excitement. not neccessarily falling in love with one person, though that is fine too, but even the way we fall in love with a friend, a group of friends, an era/ aura/ particular time in our lives, even the way we fall in love with music again, or words.
3. after grocery shopping today, finn and i were driving to the post office. i looked back at him, and he was car-dancing, shaking his head side to side and wiggling about. i do declare my heart was thumping in a glad way that he would dance so! oh i believe the song was "lemonworld". . .d.d.d.d.d.d.d.d.d....