Artist

Alexander Averin

Thursday 6 December 2012

Just a poem


For Elizabeth


Illegitimate


On a silent, irridescent, cobweb morning
I laid my indigo baby in a
cradle of crystal, her wrap was pure love,
intractable and true, like her beauty.
Be under no illusion, she was born
from an illicit assignation, but to
a world  where forgiveness was forbidden.
I was labelled loose, wild, irrational
but my life had always been impervious to hope,
and happiness incomprehensible.
Unable to speak, or break our silence,
I held her hand as I breathed my goodbyes
and wished for her a life more illustrious.
When she had been taken I could breathe no more;
for I was suffocating slowly under
lumps of hardstone, which became lodged in my heart
with an inextricable, forever kind of pain.
in a locked-in, forever kind of silence.



Cait O’Connor


7 comments:

Teresa Evangeline said...

Beautiful, Cait, beautiful. I cannot imagine having to live inside that moment.... Where do you go from there?

Cait O'Connor said...

Where indeed? (I am not the mother in the poem).
Thank you for your kind words.

Vee said...

Oh I am glad that you are not writing of your own experience. You are incredibly empathetic. What words. They grab the heart and squeeze it tight.

elizabeth said...

Dear Cait
You poem is beautiful and heartbreaking
I think you have really understood (well as much as I can understand it) the horrible grief that a mother must feel when giving up a child --and ever afterwards. A beautiful poem.

I'm so touched you liked my book which was really my attempt to try to understand both my mothers' lives and feelings.

I would be so thrilled if you wanted to review it ! I would be really happy if it got a bigger audience.

Frances said...

Cait, how gently, beautifully, your poem draws us in, and then gives us an opportunity to realize the depth of the farewell it describes.

What a poet you are.

Thank you. xo

Mac n' Janet said...

Heartbreaking and as always memorable. You have a very special gift Cait.

Dave King said...

Your poem has that rare beauty that only sadness can bestow, and then only with a great poetic skill. It's rather special.