I've Become My Mother

essay published in Catapult Magazine

How to Give Great Gifts

article published in Catapult Magazine

My 13-year-old Little Woman Speaks to 23-year-old Me on Another Halloween

published in Catapult Magazine

original 10.16.2000

The Law of Love

A Life of the Ages song
lyrics by Steve Lansingh
music by Steve Lansingh & Amanda Caldwell


Download the mp3
Listen online at ReverbNation.com or below (track #8)





Official audio disclaimer/apology

Two Piece

My baby doesn't swim when I do,
an hour every Friday,
pushing myself off from the sides
while he (she?) floats,
weightless and silent.

Each night
I hypnotize my limbs,
let my thoughts rise like bubbles,
feel my body loose and limp,

and then the swimming of my baby begins,
dancing past my stillness.

This is not part of me.



You are a new self.

You will never stay
within the narrow ropes of my lane.
Disregarding my favorite games,
choosing unlikely teammates,
evading what I enjoy
and pursuing what I do not.
Darting past
my must-haves, my absolutes,
and turning back to laugh.

You will choose
and plan
and dream
and move,
swimmingly.



I don't need to cut the cord
to symbolize what I already know.
I have your constant beating fins
to kick it into me.

You will repel the lifeguards'
calls and cautions,
diving into the cold headfirst.

From placenta to milk to mothering,
you'll freestyle to and away,
surprising me with a splash,
to take what you need
and give what you choose.



Bare feet slapping the deck,
child's triumphant echoes to the ceiling,
chlorine sharp in your nose,
swim free from me,

from this pool out into the
wild, wide ocean.

I gladly slice the line holding you
and grant what is not mine to give —
yourself.

Robin

I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies. Do you believe this? — Jesus

Robin like the hope of spring
Robin like the blue of an egg, the peace of that blue filtering through me and healing

We buried you, Robin,
or maybe it was umbilical cord or placenta or blood (but let's believe),
in the hardy mum that weathered
summer and winter, drought and flood,
one journey from East Coast to Midwest in the oppressive droopiness of summer,
and one from Midwest to West Coast in the blasting chills of winter,
and even my unmotherly indifference.
Will I one day be a Hardy Mum, Robin?
I feel more like a Bleeding Girl.

Robin, a unique mix of two people who loved you,
and we'll never know if you had brown eyes or Caldwell green,
or if you skipped the odds entirely and went with your namesake blue,
like a daring surprise in a nondescript nest.
Would you inherit my chirping child's always-singing voice,
your dad's flights into the airy forgetfulness of thought,
my persistent hopefulness for a green thumb as I dig in the dirt?

Robin like a wish
Like a wish
Like a wish

End of the Bleeding

Who knew I'd feel this desperate
To hold on to the bleeding?

To realize I can trade in maxi for mini,
And I insist on the industrial-size.

A few more drops of liquid life,
And you're gone, little one,
Gone,
Along with all that housed you.

My uterus is an empty rented house,
Scrubbed clean,
Waiting for the next inhabitant.

Death of the Firstborn

This Birth was hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. — T.S. Eliot

They all look quite like you at that age,
      and dead like nothing at all,
      a clot of purple-gray, sticky and wrapped with strong, black ribbons.

Feeling you leave in a gush of pain and red,
      in the blackest and loneliest part of the night,
was a hard & bitter agony,
      like giving birth,
giving birth to death.

Why were we led all that way, and never to see your face?
How could I do this again?
Death of the firstborn,
      and God spares no one,
      because why should we be passed over?

Grandma

There's no Candy Land in heaven, don't worry,
      but there are donuts.
Glistening round and lightest brown
      with cracking sugar glaze,
Made by a little old granny
      in pink tennis shoes.
No, but that's not right —
      they were neutral and sturdy,
Nurse's shoes, your only shoes,
      and you were regular-size. Grandma-size.
With long gray hair wound in a bun,
      like dough ropes twined into shape,
Then white hair curled in a perm,
      sugar glazing, tight as donuts on a dowel.

I learned more about you in your obituary
      than what ever left your lips.
But maybe it did, so maybe I mean
      than what ever reached my ears.
I had small ears then,
      and they could take only so much.
So what they took was your gentle interest in my life,
      an easy introduction to yours.
The best way to keep apples from browning,
      the best sugar-water to attract hummingbirds.
The best way to stand so still and feed deer,
      and the electric way to keep them out of your garden.
And you read my favorite stories and played my boring games,
      and you let me dance among your ballerina fuchsias
And you let me pet the soft leaves of your African violets,
      and you cut open your aloe when I,
Clumsy as you were graceful,
      burned myself in your kitchen.

You were only Grandma to me,
      my world beginning and ending when I did,
And though I know what I knew was good,
      I know there was more than that.

That's why I suppose there's no Candy Land in heaven.
      But there must be a kitchen there,
And you can make donuts — when you wish —
      and lure us with sensual chocolate chip cookies
And tease our tongues with savory peanuty balls
      with crisp chocolate coating, bittersweet between teeth.
And you'll tell us your stories, all that makes you you,
      And we will eat it all up,
Licking sugar off of our lips.

Unwilling

A 50-year-old shouldn't die,
and if he can go, so can I,
      and so can you.
And I can do nothing but grieve in advance
and pull you back, grasping,
tearing your shirt on the way to the altar.

Can I be Abraham and not expect the ram?
Can I raise my knife and plunge,
not expecting a halting hand?
Plunge into my love, into my heart,
into my dearest joys.
Plunge into the beating heart of my man,
the beating heart of my son,
the beating heart of my dreams,
      plunge into me.
Can I allow lifeblood to pour
without hope of heaven or tourniquet?

But how can I restrain the flow of the tide?
How can I grasp the water of life?
Even clenched fists leak,
the water silently seeping
without our seeing
and when we open our hands to pour,
      it is gone.
Damp palms, cramped knuckles,
glistening with our loss.

Within the Wolf

Visiting grandchildren are
nothing but bad. This day
started with a wolf attack.

Squeaky demands dimmed
by the walls of muscle
and skin, by the humming of
blood through veins.
His voice rumbles in my
pressed-close ears, a father's
low and reassuring.

It's better to hear him than to see him,
much better.

So much waiting,
like the ticking of a clock,
the growling of a stomach,
and I don't know whether it's mine
or his.

The gentle squeezing of the womb,
the reassuring beating of a constant heart,
until the violence stops it.

They pull me out of my rolled position,
a girl's shaking hand
and a strong man's forceps grip.

A hunter, with red paws
and satisfied grin.

And I'm out, reborn
at the end of my life.

Sticky with birthing fluid,
I'm naked, and the air
around me chills.

Misrouted

I took the wrong bus,
the slow meanderer.
Two women talked
in the seat in front.
One studied English
because she loves to read.
One mastered German
to learn to speak.
And it was the two mes
debating the paths
I could have taken.
My two selves,
my two interests and loves.

But it's not me, is it?
Because it's not
all about me.
And these are
other women,
and this is not my route,
this not my bus.
I've gotten off.