Poems

Undress Yourself and Dress Me in Your Body

Undress yourself and dress me in your body,
and I will adorn it with the dress of my poem.
Yes, take it off and dress me in your body,
Because this emptiness is heavy, so very heavy
and I don't think I can bear it for nine more months.
Undress yourself and dress me in your body -
you know best how to make it suit me,
how to infuse it with the scent of womanly perfume -
like the pervasive smell of coffee in the morning.
Take it off and dress me in your body
and I will answer all those questions
you answered me with awkwardness and silence -
after all, I'm no stranger to your ways.
Peace is shattered. Not all the disassembled bodies can be mended.
Day and night you leave the shutters open
so the swallows returning from the south
whose nest is in our attic
won't let their eggs go cold,
will teach their chicks to fly.
 
Do you know the kind of peace I long for?
As a child, surprised by endless snowflakes,
you welcomed them and said,
'Don't worry - the world can hold them all'.
Now, I worry I will never be surprised again....
You know, I made my father never think of dying;
I told him, 'Once you go, it will be my turn next'
and I asked him not to add me to the queue.
It worked....
So, undress yourself and dress me in your body
and I'll reveal my dreams to you:
I am reborn as a woman again
and, in bearing children, I continue -
I never end, I populate the world.
Undress yourself and dress me in your body
or watch this awkward smile freeze on my lips like silence.
Then I won't have an answer for the children in my dreams:
'Mummy, is it hard to be a mother?'