Seventeen

I gave birth to a daughter.

So young,

Everyone thought they could tell me what to do.

“Get an abortion.�

“Give up your baby.�

“Get married.�

I did not listen.

I kept my baby and I do not

Regret.

I had a person growing inside me,

Changing.

Like a tiny alien taking over my body,

My life.

Everything I did from that moment on

Had a purpose.

My child was born in my living room.

Less than five hours of labor,

Pain.

I became part of it,

Completely gone into myself,

To a place I didn’t know I had.

People were in the room and I had no idea who or what.

I was opening, moaning, becoming.

Gravity changed.

Panic, for just a moment,

My body did what it knew,

What women’s bodies have always known.

No control, just surrender.

And then, in a slippery rush of tiny arms and legs and fluid

I was a mother.

She cried for a second, opened her eyes,

And I knew her.