I did not like to be held as a child
trapped in my mother's lap. Her arms
constricting, every fidget of my body. Nowhere
for my head to go, except the shallow
blanket of flesh and bone cradling her
hummingbird heart.
It beat
like a windstorm.
It shifted
And could gush like molasses
or spit like lighting
and no matter what
I could not move
just lay there eyes wide open,
feeling everything a child shouldn’t
It did not mean I did not love her
I just hated thinking, that’s all kids were for
I loved to be out in the backyard more
Just beyond the garden, lived a tree line
I was tiny yet, curious enough to crawl and find
a little hollow place inside where the branches ended
and an oasis created itself
I’d lay there, no less small, but feeling very big
I’d breathe it all back into the earth
until my hummingbird heart quit
pounding like a sugar rush
Until all movement slowed
and the fidgets could be free
I could dissolve back into myself
just me, just there, just to be
with my own hand
on my own hummingbird heart
only alone, did it ever feel
like it belonged entirely to me
Grace E Wagner is a poet, and nervous system in recovery. She lives in Fort Wayne IN, and holds a degree in Creative Writing, from Ball State University. Her poems, “Keep Me Around,” “Kaleidoscope Girl,” and “Rambling to Persephone” have been featured in the Wild Sound, Bangalore Review, and Scapegoat Review literary magazines. Grace loves butterflies and drinks too much coffee. Her poetry says everything she can’t articulate linearly. These poems are for Nellie.