thanks to: http://planetcity1.wordpress.com/2009/07/10/currently-on-display/ for the great photo

Waiting in line with groceries

I notice

this neighborhood is sexy.

I feel a familiar tingle  as I

check out

the plateau people

shiny peacocks a-shimmer

with the glow of love, art and

their strut.

It’s a pleasure to be seen in the check out line,

expressing myself with movement,

sending out ripples of,

of, joy

through my skin.

In one surprising moment of grace

in the check out line

I become vividly aware of the blood

flowing through my veins and arteries,

my nerves, muscles, bones

and organs.

Then my uterus and ovaries send off vibrations

as if to get my attention and tell me

that they are doing their work,

cycling,thankless, without my direction or intention.

My breasts that tirelessly fattened my babies

used to fill with milk and leaked when they cried.

My womb was a home for life to evolve and grow

and grow

so my skin stretched itself to the point of cracking

and then, when it was time,

my stubborn cervix, despite my desperate pleas

each time

did not want to soften and open.

Still,

as I remember it,

the force of labour

eventually broke down

all resistance.

Two times.

The force of labour broke down

the cervical wall

Like the dance of unions and big business

it’s a real liberation story.

My vagina is called many things but

what a passageway.

It’s the Life Channel

channeling life

opening and stretching

wet and elastic.

It’s one last dark moist embrace for my babies

before they catapult into the bright cold dry air of the hospital room.

So harsh to be pushed out into

the sharp air of the world.

From here on in,

they will seek wet dark places and embraces

like the rest of us.

And now, years later

this body is made for

dancing and loving

praying and coming.

Miracle marks are all over me like a map

to be traced by an exploring finger

Belly, hips, breasts changed

nipples enlarged by the hungry sucking

of growing babies.

And my cervix, scarred with evidence of

a serious labour dispute.

My badges of honour.

My pride.

All this with soymilk, broccoli, humus and rice

in the check out line.

Is this for delivery?

Yes.  Deliver me.

thanks to: http://planetcity1.wordpress.com/2009/07/10/currently-on-display/ for the great photo