Saturday, October 1, 2011

How We Do It: Part IV in an ongoing series

Sophie and Henry, 1999


When Sophie had a big seizure at breakfast this morning, like she does most mornings, I undid her seat-belt and tried to prevent her arms and legs from banging into the table. I gathered her, jerking, into my arms and sat in the seat myself and noticed that her bony limbs were cushioned by my soft, perhaps too soft but then again, maybe in a good way, soft hips and arms and breasts and that is what I thought about as I sat there, enclosing her, Henry tipping his blue and black baseball hat to me and stroking Sophie's leg with his own broad hands. I thought of bones and tissue, what knits the two together, the point of her elbow wedged into the soft curve of my breast, a hip sharp in my stomach, an extended leg stiff against my thigh. Her bones grew inside me and still, I hold them, awkward and tensed, articulate in the folds.

17 comments:

  1. What an incredibly poignant scene.

    Love.

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  2. Yin and yang and so much more .....

    (hug)

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  3. Elizabeth-

    I can't imagine a deeper embodiment of grace.


    bless you and yours.


    yrs-


    tearful

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  4. you write light into the darkness. i don't know how, but you do. may grace enfold you, today, as your words have enfolded me in their grace.

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  5. It's what women do, we hold the world together.

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  6. You have those soft curves for a very good reason, Lovey. x0 N2

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  7. oh elizabeth. this is hard, i know, but your sense of it here, the way you share, it's exquisite.

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  8. Oh, my. For the book.
    And Hooray for your curves.

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  9. Your how we do it posts are my very very favorite - so beautiful.

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  10. Somewhere in the midst of your words I went from reading sentences to being there- feeling bones pressed against my own soft flesh.

    Beautiful writing.

    I hold you both in my heart.

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  11. Elizabeth, I agree with Denise: for the book. With your soft flesh, radiant heart, and strong hands you are a gatherer.

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  12. Only you can make poetry out of a seizure. Love you.

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  13. Beautiful beautiful writing. You blow me away Elizabeth. And that Henry and oh that photo. Wow.

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  14. Just beautiful, and beautifully sad. Love that photo.

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