Across the heart line on her palm
she traced a line of ink
from the pen her grandmother used
to sign marriage certificates
and score scrabble.

The ink seeped into the groove of her skin,
and spidered out into the edges
of where I stop and you begin.

When she was pregnant with my mother,
I existed in them both,
a fleck of genetics & stardust,
born through storms & blood like rust.

I have her fingernails.
A mountain range on every finger.
Ridges and peaks and valleys and creeks.
I have her age spots on my cheeks.

And I have her sense of wonder
that leaves me wowed and bowed in surrender.
Time and time again,
I'll press my forehead to the floor
in awe
of it all.

That is the call.

To listen & marvel at these feet on the earth.
The marvel of birth.
The women split open again and again to bring it all forth
with that same knowing that keeps the stars glowing and the sunflowers growing & prompts the moon to pull the tides up round her knees.

I am her.
With the bumblebees,
and the fleck of green in my eyes.
The way we dilate
at the sun rise.

And pour our life
back into the mother,
to be born again and again.

✨