I’m driving home talking 
To him about you and crying
With a head ache

I am sometimes still confused 
About which one feels more 
Like home 

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That’s what my dad said on the best night of the year,
so I guess I’ve always been waiting for the end 

Always people are leaving and happiness is ending
and enjoy it while it lasts is just 
grief wrapped up in a pretty bow

I’ve always believed this curse 
and it’s always proving me right

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I’ve been thinking what a comfort it is 
to be known by you

There’s always been a sort of 
fearlessness to us, in spite of
well, everything

Our shoes clutter the doorway
and we talk about bills with a knot in our chest
and the clothes heap themselves in a mound 

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I was probably 13 the first time 
I told someone I felt fat

Maybe I didn’t say it like that
but I felt it like that

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I point out the squirrels to you
and laugh when you laugh
and clap when you clap
and I’ve been thinking about murder lately

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The feel of my daughter’s hand in my hand
The smell of the field after cutting the hay

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That marriage is hearing 
the same story the same way
seven times since Tuesday

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He made love to me like my body was a miracle
and now a miracle is forming inside me

And I worry you forget that
I’ve never done this before

But the Giver of life put life-giving in my veins 
where my blood flows and pours out 
and it is an outpouring of love

My daughter is born of blood sweat and tears 
like you
from the body of a woman

Holy holy holy 
is the Lord God
in the dirt, covered in blood
from the legs of a girl
who had never done this before

You said ‘do not be afraid’
and I bite my tongue to keep from rebuking you

I imagine the angels words 
ringing in her ears
as she watched you 
covered in your own blood 
hit the dirt

'Afraid'? My God
There are not words for what she felt
as she wished you back to the
blessed and cursed dirt 
where you lay crying and alive 
and covered in her own blood

My God, my God, why—

I believe in the dark that
you know a mother’s grief better than I 

So when you say,
‘I will not leave you as orphans,
I will come to you’

I am begging you
bent over my steering wheel 
pressing my palms to my eyes
unable to breathe 
against the weight of a dying people

I beg you to come to Palestine
as a destroyer 
and a mother
like a river in a dry land 

'Let my people go'

I am a broken tape—
what else is there to say?

“When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy… Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like streams in the Negeb! Those who sow in tears shall reap with shouts of joy! He who goes out weeping, bearing the seed for sowing, shall come home with shouts of joy, bringing his sheaves with him.”
‭‭Psalm‬ ‭126‬

The sun sneaks inside our apartment 
through the blinds and it's quiet 
your hands holding my hand
your fingers all lined up on mine

All my life I have been told— too fast
time flies, stay young, enjoy it while it 
lasts, it doesn’t

I try not to think about it 
while my back hurts from holding 
your small body against mine,
the blinds closed against the light

There is no grief in motherhood,
only love which is always both

And I am trying to be brave,
to be a big girl, but I’m just a little girl,
and I am trying not to romanticize 
the idea of you staying small 

When instead I could have you here,
tripping over your elbows trying to crawl,
holding your books with your whole body,
shrieking with delight 

I could have you ten years from now 
in your pajamas you picked out,
doing front flips on the couch

Maybe I will have you thirty years from now
my arms wrapped around your sweaty neck 
with a heart beating in your open arms as you realize,
"Holy shit, this is what she felt like." 

And I’ll hold you and cry, 
because it has always been better to have you,
to have you
to have 
you

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I have been touched all my life
in so many insignificant ways

So it catches me by surprise 
to be caught by surprise on a June day 
while my feet are burning on the sand

It's always strange to bare your heart
to someone who's known you 
since you were a child

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Olivia,
don’t be afraid

I know your father sometimes
warned you what other men
would think about you

And it made you wonder,
worry what he thought of you

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The sky fades to pink, lilac,
deep indigo,
black

I am busy loving you
when the darkness comes

I keep myself busy, ignoring
the sound of the unknown knocking
at the apartment door

I am busy kissing you on the lips
and carrying our daughter on my hips 

I stay busy looking up at the leaves
and placing books on hold at the library 

I am planning my daughter’s Halloween costume
for two years from now when I can’t see my hand
held right in front of my face

I am busy filling up notebooks, slowly, slowly,
letting the shower head rinse my hair

Feel it flow down my scalp
running, collecting in rivulets over
my neck where my hair no longer falls

I am running my hands through my hair
and crying when I feel afraid
and learning not to cower from the darkness

Look at the light all around me

Let me press it into paper,
find my scissors and cut it into pieces,
folded over and over again, to confetti

Spread to the masses
like You fed the 5,000

Abundance from lack,
enough from nothing,
faith like ashes

How generous You are to show us,
even when we were too stubborn to see

I am staying busy,
like the jar of oil
in the hands of the widow
who had no reason to believe

Where I thought the darkness
would consume me—

Bread and a little oil,
more than enough to go around