Happy Mother’s Day

Happy Mother’s Day!

As mother’s day came to an end, I can’t help but to think about the exalted nature of mothers and our triumph.  Our job essentially is to birth other human beings, keep them alive and teach them how to keep themselves alive.  Many days we take for granted the gift of life.  We take for granted the fact that we survived to see our babies into the world.  Women still die in childbirth all the time.  Around the world many mothers lose their children before the age of 5 due to infection, poor sanitation or lack of food.  Little babies die from simple things like diarrhea.

I earned my stripes today- dealing with a daughter who wanted it to be “Daughter’s Day” so that she could get her way and a son who had not completed an extensive project due this week.  By the time they went to bed I was stressed and not much feeling like it was my day at all.  Then I read the below poem and I thought of the triumph of my own life.  I am alive, clothed in my right mind and I have have happy, healthy children.  I am a mother- proud and strong.  I am a mother- flawed and unsure.  I am a mother and I have kept my children alive through God’s grace and blessings.  What do I have to be stressed about?

 

“Won’t You Celebrate With Me” – Lucille Clifton

 

Won’t you celebrate with me

What I have shaped into

a kind of life? I had no model.

born in babylon

both nonwhite and woman

what did i see to be except myself?

i made it up

here on this bridge between

starshine and clay,

my one hand holding tight

my other hand; come celebrate

with me that everyday

something has tried to kill me

and has failed.