Here and Now
by Ann Campanella
There is a sense of unrealness,
not just that you’re here,
but that you came pushing through,
wet and urgent, tiny lungs gulping,
chest sinking and expanding
as you cried for the mother country.
That you shake your rattle fiercely,
mouth the velvet ears, squeeze your fingers,
open them, let the rabbit drop
to the floor, lean over as far as you can
to see where it lands. That your eyes
follow me as I scout the room for toys
or burp cloths or fallen rattles.
That your lower lip pouts as you concentrate
or drift off to sleep in the stroller
we push around the living room.
It’s the red crest of your hair, scent of your forehead,
warmth of your neck. It’s your whole body
shrieking, your mouth, how it opens
like a beak when I feed you.
You are earth and sky, sudden
as a breeze, sharp as a bird’s cry,
quiet as clouds floating in a cradle of blue.
Not tomorrow, but some day soon
you will be winging away
and I will be gone.
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Ann Campanella was formerly a magazine and newspaper editor. She writes poetry, creative nonfiction and fiction. Her work focuses on her love of family, nature and animals. Twice, she received the Poet Laureate Award from the North Carolina Poetry Society and her poetry was selected for the Blumenthal Readers & Writers Series. Her writing has also been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Outrunning the Rain, her first poetry collection, was published in 2006. She lives on a small horse farm in Huntersville, NC, with her husband, daughter and animals.
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