Birth
Feb 17th, 2007 by Hari Bhajan
This poem was written a good 25 years after giving birth. We have only one child so the memory of this time is very strongly embedded in my heart and mind. Birthing a baby and going on the yatra to Hemkunt Sahib in India, were the two most diffcult times in my life in terms of body, mind and spirit having to rise to the occasion and knowing that once begun, there was no turning back until the pinnacle was reached. Both experiences, of course, brought an unimaginable wealth of spirit and love into my life. When Sat Sangeet was born I began to know the depth of what it was to be a woman, a mother, a guiding light to a new soul, one that came to earth to be a hero, a giver or a saint.
To hear the poem read aloud click on the arrow on the bar below the photos.
********
Birth
Bracing against pale-
green ashram walls for a day,
a night, another day, I walk,
squatting in doorways every
five to seven minutes, breathing,
breathing. The second night
you mount the wave
and I, the vessel, fasted
and pouring sweat and blood,
turn into the storm:
body within body we seek the shore.
The mantra of raindrops
on roof and windowpane, chanting
from the room below guides you
out into the morning
haze. Wrapped in blue eyes, fingers
and toes rippling, you
splay on the altar of my ribs.
********
Me, pregnant. fall, 1974 at our farm in Bend, Oregon.
Two days after the birth of Sat Sangeet at the Portland ashram where I spent my forty days.
Birth by Hari Bhajan Kaur
