The Rattle

I lay in my bed, as I have for forty days,
Listening, listening...but always in a daze;
The doctors say my body has healed,
But they don't understand what I have concealed.

My husband didn't carry her for 3/4ths of a year,
He didn't feel her kick, and understand her fears;
He'll never understand the communion of daughter and mother,
Two people sharing one body, never closer to one another.

I never got to see her with my own eyes,
And each and every day a piece of me dies;
A coffin as small as a pillow,
But wait now! Wait...what is that billow?

I have heard that sound before, once long ago,
I prop myself up, to listen more intently to the flow;
A musical sound, a tingle of melody,
A chorus of enthusiasm strings from that harmony.

I listen for hours, and then for days,
It's encouragement, it's freedom, it's power to drive away the gray;
My husband says it's only the wind chimes,
But in my head and heart, I know it's the sound of the baby's rattle...and all is sublime.