My Dear Readers:
Today is Mother's Day, a day of honoring mothers and grandmothers for their contributions to our families, communities and society. I would like to share with you the following haiku and tanka about the different stages and impacts of motherhood:
on the toilet
she watches her test growing
a second red line --
outside the bathroom door
twin toddlers crying, mommy
Chen-ou Liu
pregnant again ...
the fluttering of moths
against the window
Janice Bostok
snowdrops ...
the first ultrasound
becomes the last
Tia Haynes
abortion day
a shadow flutters
the fish tank
Roberta Beary
between blood of birth
and blood of death
a new life
on the hospital floor ...
a Gazan mother's last look
Chen-ou Liu
the newborn
empties my friend's breast
in long drains
she's flooded with oxytocin,
with a mix of love and panic
Chen-ou Liu
breast-feeding
a gesture of something
beast-like
pitiful to think tenderly
that it is called a child
Fumi Saito
my Christian friend
fought a tough civil war
against his gayness ...
his mother who never fought him
now sets out to fight her world
Chen-ou Liu
mother’s log books:
rainfall in mm
sun in degrees
all these comings and goings
on the stage of her life
Sandra Stephenson
my mother sings
as she brushes her hair
of fine silver …
lament for the girl
missing from the mirror
Gavin Austin
mother laments
being old and bent
I see her
as a curved branch
laden with fruit
Kala Ramesh
my mother
forgets morning glory ...
sitting by the window
she grows the flower
in her heart
Ikuyo Yoshimura
child wife mother
I’ve been many things
poet teacher
one who sits all afternoon
gum leaves filtering the light
Kathy Kituai
Happy Mother's Day
Chen-ou
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