WHAT YOUR MOTHER NEVER TOLD YOU

If I could, I would apologise 
as often as the ocean sinks ships,
engrave each wave with your name.
I’d fill pages with black ink to explain how loving you
feels like drowning.

Loving you was waking up in hot sweats
to check your heartbeat in the middle of the night.
I was afraid my love would suffocate you,
turn your lips lavender,
so I left you crying in your crib.

My womb was once
your ocean.
I used to imagine you
a sea lion
with grey rubbery skin,
diving through rings inside my belly. 

You kept slipping through my grasp 
like seaweed.
I didn’t know how to hold 
your head upright,
or stop salty tears falling.

My love, loving you is holding the Pacific Ocean
in a leaky bucket. Being your mother is learning how to swim
blindfolded. I’m sorry for each morning I wake up 
wishing
I could throw you back 
into the sea. 

---

Anna Matheson, 26, Wellington - New Zealand ✯ IG: @anna_kate13

“Anna Matheson is an aspiring writer who resides in Wellington. By day she works at a kindergarten, but by night she types away on her turquoise typewriter and questions how to pay off her student loans. Her poems have been published in The Quick Brown Dog journal and Nowhere Girl Collective.”