On Hearing

I've noticed since I became a mother that my hearing has changed. I can detect the smallest of sounds, and most of all I hear the voice of children hollering "momma" as if I'm that in tune with them that I hear their voices in different places. And it's not just my own kids--when I'm out at a park or any public place my ears always zero in on childrens' chants for their mothers and I will search the crowd to make sure their cries are answered. Often I know I'm only imagining it when I hear their voice carried through the air on the backs of birds and bugs and wind scuttling leaves. I should know to trust listening. Yesterday morning as I sat on the back patio writing under the stars at 4 am I heard the cry for momma as if it was carried on the back of a beetle--so small and faint. I thought it couldn't be real as my kids were sleeping, but the sound started to grow. What had been a distant speck of a sound grew closer and I realized it was my daughter after all and she was hollering for her dang pacifier. I should have known to follow my first instinct. As a parent you realize quickly how instinct seizes you and how more than ever in your life you need to follow it. It's a sentiment we hear so often from people--I should have followed my gut--but we don't always do that, as if we don't trust ourselves enough. But being responsible for another life you don't have that option--you have to be the one who carries that weight, who follows their gut, and follows through. When my kids were born I felt that there was a new confidence born in me. Me--the woman who didn't even like to order a pizza over the phone was now the woman who said I got this. A friend of mine wrote a novel last year (it's really great and I'm confident that it will be published and you all can read it soon). He used me as sort of an inspiration for one of the characters. Her name: Casey. Occupation: mother and poet. He asked me to write a few poems from the character's perspective that he would include in the novel and so I did and here is one:

I hear you call for me in the song of the swallows

or the wind threading through branches. Momma

in the rallying bark of neighborhood dogs.

Momma in the footsteps of strangers passing

in leafy streets. Motherhood means hearing –

sharp as the crack of a bat – your name

always on the tip of my tongue. It means

I think of you without thinking.

I want to say that I am infinitely aware

of you but that isn’t enough. Who but a mother

could say that every look at you is a lesson

of time? Though days are long, the years are short.

Even grown into your name I still picture you

small – your eyes like stars in your head

as I push you in a swing, and you begging –

skinned knees and all – for it to never stop.

I am the reluctant wind at your back.