Four. It doesn’t seem like four years since you arrived. I look back at your tiny crinkled baby feet photos and your one-year old smile, Your two-year old pigtails. I think back on this last year as we celebrated you at three, And look at you now. The laughter and mischief twinkling in your eyes. […]
poems
Metamorphosis
A poem about becoming a mother In the moment you arrived and your cry echoed through my heart I became someone new. A different version of myself as if I’d stepped from a cocoon. Still the same but changed. So deep deep in love, exhausted, transformed, in awe and terrified. A mother. Still […]
Lucky
Parenthood poetry I woke tired and grumpy today after a night with an unsettled little and a lie-in that was broken up by prodding fingers and shouts and shrieks. I went outside to the garden, cradling a cup of tea drank in some sunshine, picked the last of the sweetpeas, took a few moments […]
A Big Step
When they placed you on my chest and I smiled and said, “Oh, it’s you”, as if I already knew the corners of your face, this day felt so very far away. Baby days spent in a bubble with toddler days stretched out ahead – fort-building, slow toddler-paced walks outdoors, and afternoons curled up in […]
The Path Ahead
I can see her, round that corner Standing there, Waving as he walks away, Kissing her before she runs off, Feeling more than a little lost. The silence in the house is deafening. She is still getting used to having Time again Up till now it was in such short supply Oh, how she’d longed […]
Now You’re Two
You’re two. I look at you and wonder when you changed and how you grew so much before my eyes. I didn’t notice the small changes day by day – it took me by surprise. Suddenly – overnight, or so it seems – you are a little girl with a personality so big and a […]
My Lap is Always Your Chair
The walls will change And the rooms and the doors, Yes, things may look different But it will be as before. Walls are just walls. A house isn’t a home when you take it apart When it’s empty of everything It’s missing its heart. When we pack up the books, the hand prints and frames […]
My Night Owl
She calls out for me with a shriek that yanks me from sleep, scattering my forty winks. She’s sitting up in her cot, arms outstretched. Hold me please. Hair sticking up in tufts on the top of her head, big eyes blinking. I pick her up and cuddle her, but she flaps around in my […]
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These Days
There are days when it feels like I’m swimming upstream, Or treading water just to keep afloat. Hit by waves of guilt For having to split myself in two. And I feel like I’m sinking under the weight of all there is to do. The hard days, the long days, the days when I’m fuelled […]
Now She’s One
A year now. Days that have passed in a blink; like the pages of a book left open in the wind. I cling to the here-and-now, before it’s another do-you-remember-when. Now she is one and he is three. The nights are long but I know this time is brief and oh-so-precious, and I try, in the […]