The Labor / Mark Mosley
This ripe melon of belly splits
open a warm dome of a garden.
The water has broken, leaving
a necessary absence of air:
Beads of sweat like seeds
of salt and rain sprout
from the furrows of the brow
and run down the skin.
A blood-bloated, full-throated blowing
—primal push out to the world.
There is no crowning of this life
without the pressing of thorns.
The second the cord is snipped;
a gasp draws which joins you to no one
when the life is completely out
of your hands and breath—
this unveiling of faces blinks
pain away like a stone moved—
opening light previously unseen,
exhausted and staring at beauty.
The Labor: Copyright 2022 by Mark Mosley. All rights reserved.
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