To Christopher

I fill the paper with the breathings of my heart[1] as I sit at my computer, fingers flying across the keys, the tap... tap... tap a soothing sound, adding to the satisfaction I feel as the page rapidly fills.

I envision a great merry-go-round spinning above my head: bright lights and the music of a calliope; rococo benches interspersed among horses, dolphins, swans. Up and down, up and down they go, like the beating of my heart, as I recall first one memory and then the next, while I continue to fill the page with the scenes and memories that flash by.

I see a little girl, lonely, neglected, abused. My heart cries out, "Why?" as I search for the reasons for mother-loss, father-loss, hunger, despair.

A young woman twirls to the sound of pulsing music. Hands above her head, a smile radiating across the dance floor, she spins for the pure joy of it. Dancing, dancing, the beat of the music rising, ascending through the brass dance floor, entering her being with a delicious, reverberating, throbbing sensation.

A bride walks down the aisle. Here, at last, is the father; a tuxedo-clad arm steadies her, as she slowly steps to the music: step, stop, step, stop. Here finally is love: a harbor, a safe place to rest.

The merry-go-round continues its circular journey. More images flash by: anniversaries, birthdays, deaths. And now, the reward for the years of sorrow: the blanket-wrapped form of one sweet child. The mother breathes him in, savors his unique scent, fills her lungs in a celebration of motherhood. The child cries, and her heart leaps at the sound of it, the joy of it; the completion of it.

Up and down, up and down, the spinning of memories, of images, of bullfrog hunts and toys, birthday parties and homework, tiny, ink-stained hands pressed to a paper doily - a Mother's Day gift, tears: running to Mama for comfort, lip closures and bone grafts, that first broken heart.

I fill the paper with the breathings of my heart as the merry-go-round spins: up and down, up and down, the images flashing by. I see the brass ring. I reach for it and make it mine!

[1]"Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart..." William Wordsworth

Warning: All poems/articles/works by the author are protected by copyright laws against the risk of plagiarism. To safeguard the author, a regular search of the Internet is provided to ensure this law has not been broken! Any Website/Blog/Forum which displays Debra's work MUST have received her permission to do so. (Permission to adopt statement given by its creator, Debbie Stevens.)

Excerpt from Son of My Soul -The Adoption of Christopher ISBN: 1894936930 Debra Shiveley Welch, Saga Books ©2007