Childbirth and the Other
Someone says
you need a coach to do this.
We attend class,
learn and practice
what our bodies already know,
rehearse breathing, panting,
breathing the work
with others and alone, until
the womb clenches her fist,
cries push! Push!
we bear down, empty ourselves.
Pain
waits outside, forgotten.
Joy and heartbreak move in.
Donna Love Wallace (Lewisville, NC) recently completed a Weymouth residency to work on her second poetry collection, titled Stethoscopic Bodies. Her first poetry book, Between the Stones (Hermit Feathers Press, 2019) recounts her personal experience with breast cancer. Donna has held positions with Winston Salem Writers, Poetry in Plain Sight, and Hermit Feathers Press. Her work appears in Snapdragon, Wild Goose Poetry Review, Flying South, Pinesong, Kakalak, among others. Donna is a retired critical care nurse and seminarian. She enjoys bicycling and van camping with her husband, Hugh.
