Scythe<\/p>\n
Before she opens her eyes mama knows<\/p>\n
It will be today<\/p>\n
Her eyes open to greet the sun<\/p>\n
She raises her hands in a yawning stretch<\/p>\n
Pulling herself from under the heavy warmth of the quilt<\/p>\n
Mama stands leaning on the bed, breathes in, breathes out<\/p>\n
Daddy wakes and smiles at the news<\/p>\n
They dress in silence, remembering a small bag before opening the door<\/p>\n
The drive to the hospital is quick, charged with electric expectancy.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Inside the sliding doors, Daddy is detained at a desk<\/p>\n
Mama is ushered into a cold wheelchair<\/p>\n
Upstairs she must change from her warm clothes into a starchy gown<\/p>\n
Lying in a bed adorned only with a threadbare sheet<\/p>\n
Mama’s arm is inserted needles, Mama’s belly is tightly wrapped<\/p>\n
In the bed there is no freedom, and there is no freedom from the bed<\/p>\n
She’s not to sit up, not to stand<\/p>\n
All eyes on the ticking machine<\/p>\n
When the doctor decides the baby should come<\/p>\n
All voices are rough, tense<\/p>\n
It’s time for the baby. He’s not here so you must<\/em><\/p>\n push more, breathe less, lie flat, hush now<\/em><\/p>\n The baby does come, because that’s what babies do<\/p>\n and is wiped, poked, tightly wrapped, monitored<\/p>\n While the mother waits until tomorrow<\/p>\n To wrap baby in heavy warmth at home<\/p>\n unhindered<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Scythe Before she opens her eyes mama knows It will be today Her eyes open to greet the sun She raises her hands in a yawning stretch Pulling herself from under the heavy warmth of the quilt Mama stands leaning on the bed, breathes in,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":860,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,13,441],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-half-marathon-poem","category-miscellaneous","category-poetry-prompt-responses"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/860"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20174"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20388,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20174\/revisions\/20388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}