Princess Warrior

The nurse complains:
‘She’s a princess. Her sister does everything.’
 
In the room,
mesh blinds watering down sunlight
the mother,
her legs in malleable air casts,
tubes and air latched to her body,
unable to stretch,
the bloody line across her
pelvic bone aching from
its separation
 
The mother handles
her perfect baby
like sweet, fragile perfection,
as if she might dissolve
back into her blood
with a wayward glance
 
She frets over the diaper,
trembles changing a shirt,
worries she’s isn’t doing something,
or anything,
right
 
The sister commands the corner,
barking orders,
her hands experienced
from four little mouths
over the years
Her frustration
splashed across her face
when the mother
asks, pleads
for a second of assistance.
 
Sister leaves the room to walk,
the silent father follows,
and the mother
curls her handfuls of joy
into a ball upon
her heartbeat
 
Mother beams in the dim room
placing her lips upon the
butter soft top of her daughter’s hair,
then pours out her heartbreak
in a monologue to the room
 
How her last baby
ran out of her body
and fell through her fingers
in a torrential, bloody flood
Clumps of lifeless tissue
and water named Rosa,
after her great-aunt
How her joy
gave way to hopelessness,
her body a tomb
of childless despair
 
This was her miracle,
the tiny yolk sac that grew
and thrived,
and lived to be
placed in the nook of her arm
 
She holds her like glass
afraid she will disappear
or melt to the floor
molten, and untouchable
 
She worships her existence
exalts what she thought
could never be created
in the canvas of
her womb
 
She touches her with grace
and the deepest affection
earned by those
who have suffered the
annihilation of lost promises
 
To the nurse I want to reply:
‘She’s the bravest princess I’ve ever known…
 
and that makes her a warrior.’