No. Not wrong. Human. She and that man are married now, for crying out loud. It would almost be a sin for her not to have sex with the guy. This blur is increasingly and increasingly in my face. My women friends have babies. Actual babies they collected and fed in their wombs and released into this planet. And then there are others who don't have babies, but actually want them. Believe they could, as mothers, cool the fevers and understand the sobs of these tiny, mushy humans.
And they have sex--these friends of mine. Probably otherworldly, incredible sex in all sorts of rooms and confined spaces. On all sorts of desks and objects of household decoration. In front of mirrors. Over and under mirrors.
Kimiko observes the daughter. And in the same breath, recalls her own legs on the lover's shoulders. And I cried in class today. Asked that question Kimiko and every other poet--mostly female poets--ask: "How do we protect our loved ones from our poetry?"
And also, "How do we feed our poetry and also take the time to feed those loved ones?"
To be a mother who comes home from work then craves time to do real work. And as she sits to write her next masterpiece, be pestered with a beautiful, lonely child who says, as Marie put it: "Mom, how do you spell label?" And over and over again: "Mom, how do you spell label? Mom, you promised you'd spend time with me. Mom, is it L-A-B-A-L?"
It has only occurred to me today that for my mother, her poetry was [is] church. Her church. The work she puts into tiny communities of people coming to joint conclusions about belief and the existence of Loving Creator God. And for years, I judged her for it. Hated the church that took my mother's hours from me.
And Kimiko knows this hatred--the hatred only a daughter could rightly [and lovingly] direct toward the ever-giving, depleted mother who just wants to be a whole person.
An ex-boyfriend recently wrote me--only hours ago--that he doesn't miss me as a girlfriend. But he misses me as a human of conversations. As a friend.
What if I can never be a whole lover? A whole mother? What if, because of what I am--someone tethered to such a solitary, consuming craft--I can never fully love someone?
And how awful, then, if I fear that this craft could actually, in the long run [or short run?] hurt them enough that I have to change my own name so they will not find it unless I want them to?
It's difficult enough being a daughter and a poet. I should marry an illiterate man who owns a daycare.
____________
Something horrible my male friend sent me:
From the end of an episode of Leave it to Beaver:
Beaver: Mom, why do girls always make boys do stupid things?
Mom: Beaver, most girls would say boys make them do stupid things!
Beaver: Chee mom, then why don't they just leave each other alone?!
Mom: Well Beaver, it's a part of growing up. Oh dear, one day you will leave the house and fall in love and get married.
Beaver: Well ok mom. If you say so. But if I ever have to get married, I'm not going to marry any girl or anything. I'm going to marry a mother.
Screw the Cleaver family--and that entire generation of thought--for telling us you can't be both. For telling us you can't be both a girl and a mother. It's not easy... this blur.
