I wrote a poem during last week’s class of my Narrative Writing Program at BU. I have written about this program before. I took this class for BU faculty because I wanted support in writing my book, NOT because I ever wanted to write a poem. When I learned that the topic that day was poetry, I almost skipped class. I am not usually drawn to poetry. After the instructor introduced the agenda for the class, and she said that she would first talk about writing poems and then said we would be given 6 minutes to write a poem, I was uncertain. I don’t recall the last time I wrote a poem. It had to have been decades ago, back when I was forced to do so in school. I sure never voluntarily wrote a poem before. It just wasn’t my style.
But to my surprise, the poem just flowed out of me, I guess because of what I’m processing right now in my life, last week especially, with my family’s decision that my child needs to be hospitalized for his eating disorder.
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A flood of emotions washes over me
I’m drowning in my helplessness
My child will not eat
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What kind of a mother am I
If my child will not eat
–
He is starving himself
He feels helpless too
Imperfect
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And so he controls the only thing he thinks he can
Restricting what goes into his mouth
Restricting what comes out of his mouth
His throat is blocked in both directions
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What kind of a mother am I
For this to happen to my child
My throat feels tight
When I try to speak about it
–
If I open my throat
Will he open his too
If I nourish myself better
Will he allow me to nourish him as well
–
I don’t know
The future is uncertain
Always
Dr Laura Lowery's Blog 