Offspring

Here are my children
whom I’ve been nurturing,
waiting for, for 45 years.

Now they emerge fully grown,
some still immature.
None of them worldly.

These little beings
I have been gestating in my mind
will never cry all night,
though they keep me awake
and wake me early.

My babies, conceived by all my lovers,
all my friends,
all my foes,
by every notion I’ve considered, and all those I’ve passed by.

My progeny who feed on my life,
sucking the marrow from my experience
to grow fat with metaphor.

They wriggle their feet under them,
wobble their way to stand,
wrestle with their balance
whimper when they fall down,
and I, their loving mother, embrace them.

I give them the commas for support,
and spaces for expression,
and watch in awe as my babies
toddle into the world,
one after the other.