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Breastfeeding
a dinner of convenience
a deep expedient bread
from a dug like a white dolphin
O mouth
O trusting life
Poems on the topic: motherhood
Poems on the topic “motherhood” on Poets.by.
What to Do with Leaves
What to do with leaves, if one cannot leave them
Here beneath aspen, gum, maple and birch
As what they become in winter, a kind of skirt
To warm and feed fanned roots, is gather and
Toss them on a garden. She spreads hers
Over bed and path alike, with straw, with
Dead grass and weeds, barn bedding, the contents
Of kitchen bucket and tumble barrel, along
With any foliage that comes to hand, even prunings
If too small to bother with for her iron stove.
This is for worms and all their small companions
Heaving aside the earth of path and bed alike,
Leveling and loosening, making untilled tilth.
Evening comes and she stills, listening
As the city of humus thrums toward spring.
Love's Tendril
Sweeter far than lyric rune
Is my baby's cooing tune;
Brighter than the butterflies
Are the gleams within her eyes;
Firmer than an iron band
Serves the zephyr of her hand;
Deeper than the ocean's roll
Sounds her heart-beat in my soul.
Wild May
Aleta mentions in her tender letters,
Among a chain of quaint and touching things,
That you are feeble, weighted down with fetters,
And given to strange deeds and mutterings.
No longer without trace or thought of fear,
Do you leap to and ride the rebel roan;
But have become the victim of grim care,
With three brown beauties to support alone.
But none the less will you be in my mind,
Wild May that cantered by the risky ways,
With showy head-cloth flirting in the wind,
From market in the glad December days;
Wild May of whom even other girls could rave
Before sex tamed your spirit, made you slave.
Fire-Logs
Nancy Hanks dreams by the fire ;
Dreams, and the logs sputter,
And the yellow tongues climb.
Red lines lick their way in flickers.
Oh, sputter, logs.
Oh, dream, Nancy.
Time now for a beautiful child.
Time now for a tall man to come.
After Annunciation
Rest, little Guest,
Beneath my breast.
Feed, sweet Seed,
At your need.
I took Love for my lord
And this is my reward,
My body is good earth.
That you, dear Plant, have birth.
State Endowment
Flowers all natural sweet.
That women sell on baskets in the street,
Lose half their beauty in my eyes.
They are a huckster's merchandise.
Who offers, then, to buy from me
That natural service, my maternity?
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