“Motherhood: A Map,” by Chloe Martinez (Poetry ’09)

Chloe Martinez (Poetry ’09), the author of Ten Thousand Selves, was recently featured in Shenandoah. Read an excerpt of Martinez’s poem, “Motherhood: A Map,” below:

Motherhood: A Map

You are here: abject, bereft, clear (all-seeing, also
see-through); disheveled. Euphoric, enervated, flushed, faint,
fierce, and also, generous, gushing milk and patience,
goddess-like, even while grieving—what?—your good, distant self.
Heavy, heaving. Helper; holder of hands or heads.
You’ll appear, to some idiots, indignant, indigent, icky.

You’ll ignore cries, which is not to say you won’t hear them,
no, your rabbit ears will make you jumpy, jealous
of the free world. Animaled, you’ll grow keen, willing
to kill, almost, kept in the kennel of loving a small helpless thing
so helplessly that you’d carry your cub, kindred, kinder
through the streets in your very teeth…

Read this poem in its entirety here: https://shenandoahliterary.org/702/motherhood-a-map/