Sharon Dolin
The quotidian is maternal
—Fernando Pessoa
Dogs barking all night, a faraway rooster
crows to outpace the dawn-streaked sky
as I sit on the patio with my second coffee,
raisin toast topped with peanut butter
and slices of summer’s last plum:
how close my mother feels when I tend
to myself—she who nourished me
with her warm embrace, orange juice
strained of pulp, followed by cold milk
over sugar cereal. As I gave my son
the milk of my body for three years—never
an embrace so tender. We rose before
dawn, euphoric, transported
by each other. Now he cleaves
to his dark-haired wife, their cat asleep
above his head. At home, my dog,
toddler-sized, tucks into my side
at night, by morning rests his furry head
on the pillow, perpendicular to mine.
The maternal seeps into daily things—
especially nighttime and early morning.
Though she’s been dead 35 years,
I still carry my mother inside: as I lift my cup,
my hand with raised veins mirrors hers.
Back to “Motherhood and the Body”
Sharon Dolin is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Imperfect Present; a memoir entitled Hitchcock Blonde; and three books of translation, from Catalan of Gemma Gorga’s poetry: Book of Minutes, Late to the House of Words, and Voyage to the Center, which is forthcoming from the University of Pittsburgh Press in Spring 2027. Dolin is Associate Editor of Barrow Street Press and teaches in New York City. https://sharondolin.com