Have you ever been to a poetry slam?  At its best, it’s a smashed-together combination of art and improv, alive with wit and wordplay and excitement.  Of course, it can also really suck. Depends on who’s on stage.  Not that I have a lot of room to judge, since I haven’t had the guts to try it myself.  Poetry performance, yes–in the form of a poetry-reading with pages I’d already written. But the slam? I bow to those who have the guts.  Well, to those who have the guts and don’t suck.  But that’s the trick, isn’t it? I don’t know which I’d be–so I haven’t yet decided if poetry slamming should go on my Bucket List or my Fuck-It List…

Poetry when I’ve been slammed, though… That I can talk about.

A blogging-friend was asking me last week about publishing poetry, and the best advice I can offer on that topic is to check out the 2012 Poet’s Market, which is a great resource for pretty much every publication everywhere that publishes poetry, with all the specs on how to submit, what (or if) they pay, what types they’re looking for, whether they accept simultaneous submissions (meaning you can send a poem to multiple publishers at the same time… or not), what percentage of submissions they accept, and all those good stats.  Poetry doesn’t tend to pay–but it does tend to publish.  And hey, it was the thrill of the decade for me to pick up the Anthology of Idaho Women Poets at my Barnes & Noble and see my name on one of the pages.  (Of course, none of you could have found it at your Barnes & Noble–it was a local offering only–but I’ll be honest, I was thrilled anyway…)

The same blogging-friend asked if my favorite poem could be found here on Kana’s Chronicles, and I had to answer “not yet”–but that’s easily remedied.  The following is a piece written over the three months when my youngest daughter, twelve weeks premature and weighing two pounds, was “imprisoned” in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). I’ve written some about this (Amazing Grace, How Sweet the SOUNDS) but hadn’t shared the poem…  Just one note to avoid confusion, before I turn over this post to myself-of-eight-years-ago: a couple references to myself by name are using my name-of-eight-years ago…  During a different marriage, and when I went by my first name rather than my middle.  (Post about names here, if you’re curious…)

So without further ado, here’s Neonate… Poetry written when I’d been slammed by life.

Neonate

When the baby stops

breathing, an alarm rings in the NICU.

At home, the process is reversed;

when the phone rings, the mother stops–

***

The baby lives in a box.  That plastic box, there.

The baby is an electrical appliance

on a short cord.

***

three months early

can a baby

live?

No one will tell me

at the hospital where I arrive

spilling amniotic fluid

three months early

***

water broke

in my kitchen

not good

calmly

called a ride

mopped, changed pants,

woke my son

bid him brightly bye in the car

into the doors where someone would know what to do

then began to cry

***

this community, colony of moms,

our lives in orbit

around the NICU–

I introduce myself where we meet

at the phone outside the locked door,

scrub-in sink, breast milk freezer.

We don’t shake hands.  We have all scrubbed, but we are nervous

of hands.

***

The next crib over, Jose

is empty already,

not a mom here I know

(week down, months to go)

we are not, after all,

in this together

***

I pump forty ounces of milk

a day for a baby only fifty

ounces herself

and three times a night I sit up

in bed expressing

milk without a baby

***

Day 12 I can’t pick her up have never held

my baby,

mother’s and daughter’s

wails on either side of plastic walls

I ricochet from the Plexiglas barrier

till I’m able again

to pretend I’m coping

***

Lullabye

I’m sorry

little half-baked

baby, shhh, Mommy’s here

***

Baby Stats

Units

of measurement, units of progress

or regress

cc’s of breastmilk, grams of baby,

frequency of desats, occurrence of apnea

her body barely filing

            my two hands

            graying, unmoving.

            In my hands

            she has stopped breathing.

statistics, routine notation

on today’s chart

***

I hate the phone

It’s Janna Vega to see Elena, each day at the locked door

a bead on my rosary

this prayer repeated

***

disposable vessels

threaded

through this tiny body so unready

dozens of times a day

her life re-starts

Easter afternoon another infection

rosary occupying

hands empty of baby

HolyMaryfullofGrace merging

with this new IV drip

of antibiotic, drip

of Grace and I am praying

to ultrasound screens, to shrill alarms

to antibiotics,

to a stuffed frog, to pink blankets

to God in visible forms

***

I can translate every alarm.

Oxygen desaturation, heart rate, infusion complete

I hear

in my sleep

I dream myself

outside the NICU door, barred

from entering, a stream

of nurses exiting sadly

assuring me she’s fine

***

In the evening, in the NICU

a day-nurse calls me from home,

we hang up laughing.

Sum up my life: I’m taking social calls

in the NICU

***

At Entrance Five still in maternity wear

new mom watches new dad strap in new baby

to drive home, finished

with this hospital.

To see my daughter,

I stride into Entrance Five pulling off my sunglasses

fiercely

aware there’s room for jealousy in a flat belly.

***

The Traveling Parent Show

goes home empties

the dishwasher, explains

how to put on pants

pumps breasts, grades quizzes, changes

wet sheets, slices onions

defines Amen

 ***

Amen means “thank you, God, for listening.”

***

one nurse hails another:

“Mom Cervantes on the phone”

 

which makes me Mom Vega

my son lugs his mailbox into the kitchen where

I sit with coffee and journal, logging

her removed oxygen tube and

his pet dragon’s change of color–

“Here comes your mailman!

See this mail is for you: it says:

Janna…  Vega…  Mommy!”

my name

***

I ask questions full of qualifiers–

recognizing the limited powers of medical fortune-telling,

and doctors’ desire to avoid

any promise that might break

Dr. Lawrence to his tape recorder:

“Mother asked appropriate questions.”

No, Mother asked questions

he might feel unconstrained to answer.

The other questions I’m not asking

him.

***

From bare dirt by the emergency

entrance where I came in

daffodils come and gone, tulips

past, apple petals replaced

by apple leaves, roses coming on,

I am still parking

here marking time botanically