“It’s the hardest job there is…”
NaPoWriMo, Patti Smith, pregnant kiwis, and the story behind my poem in the current issue of Ekstasis
April is National Poetry Month
Tomorrow we begin National Poetry Month in the United States. From poets.org.
Launched by the Academy of American Poets in April 1996, National Poetry Month is a special occasion that celebrates poets’ integral role in our culture and that poetry matters. Over the years, it has become the largest literary celebration in the world, with tens of millions of readers, students, K–12 teachers, librarians, booksellers, literary events curators, publishers, families, and—of course—poets, marking poetry’s important place in our lives.
April is also National Poetry Writing Month (a.k.a. NaPoWriMo) which is a fun time if you ever wanted to join in. Every day a prompt is posted on the website and you get to turn a poem around in a day. No one expects greatness so there is low pressure. Hope to see some of my friends participate.
Patti Smith on motherhood
In 2007, Alan Light did a great interview with
right after she got inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Toward the end of their conversation he asked her what she thought was people’s biggest misconception of her.Please read her whole answer, but I was most interested in this part of her reply [emphasis mine]:
The conceit of people, to think that if they’re not reading about you in a newspaper or magazine, then you’re not doing anything.
I’m not a celebrity, I’m a worker. I’ve always worked. I was working before people read anything about me, and the day they stopped reading about me, I was doing even more work. And the idea that if you’re a mother, you’re not doing anything—it’s the hardest job there is, being a mother or father requires great sacrifice, discipline, selflessness, and to think that we weren’t doing anything while we were raising a son or daughter is appalling. It makes me understand why some human beings question their worth if they’re not making a huge amount of money or aren’t famous, and that’s not right.
That is the unsung heroics of parenting. I been a 12-hour-day working mother. I have been a stay-at-home mother. I am not a rock star. Not famous or rich. It doesn’t matter. No one really gets renowned for being a good parent.
But sometimes when I think of the burdens of motherhood I can’t help but think of this poor thing…
A couple of years ago, a picture of a female kiwi bird skeleton that went viral on Reddit. The kiwi egg takes up 20% of the female's body space, and supposedly when the chick is born it is the size equivalent of a 4-year-old child.
If any bird could curse God I think it would be the pregnant kiwi.
And yet we bear what we need to bear, and we are somehow designed for special kinds of ridiculousness.
Motherhood… it’s not for the faint of heart.
And speaking of mothers and birds
I have always thought Ekstasis was one of the most beautiful online literary journals around, so it was a joy to find out that one of my poems was selected to be in their Winter 2 collection.
Not only that, but two friends from my CLA poetry critique group are also featured this winter: Tamara Nichols-Smith’s “Mid-Lent” and Fr. Phil Flott’s “His Origin is from Old”.
My contribution—“Sorrow”—is quite simple by comparison. A number of people have seen this poem in different iterations. I am thankful to Melanie, Heidi, and Lindsey for viewing earlier versions of this poem (as well as for all the support and encouragement). I greatly appreciate Dana’s generous feedback. And I am especially grateful to Paul who looked at the poem IRL his past fall and told me to specifically submit it to Ekstasis.
The poem was inspired by my battle to hide my mental illness from my children. I was seven-years-old the first time I ever told anyone that I wanted to die, and that feeling was to grow worse and worse as time went on. It became particularly unbearable during my childbearing years when the hormonal shifts of pregnancy made it impossible to control my depression with therapy and medication. There was a point when I knew that my illness was keeping me from being the mother I needed to be. “Sorrow” developed from my hopes of how my children will look back on their childhood. That the sadness that held me was something I couldn’t really let go of and so I bore it as best as I good.
I do not know if many of readers will find this poem relatable. It would be interesting if someone were to find some unintended meaning in what was written. Literature takes on a life of its own once it goes out into the wild. It’s quite a lovely and terrifying thing.
Like a hawk launching off a branch.
It's a lovely grace-filled poem. Actually, I loved your friends' poems as well.
I can relate, having suffered something of the sort with my own children. But I thought it was about sorrow for the loss of a child when I read it.