The Conundrum: Splitting The Baby) for Kimberly Mays Twigg

I.

Sometimes, I ask myself why I didn’t give her back sooner.  Would it have been easier then, before I knew her personality, the sweet meaning of her every sound, every movement?  Already I loved her smell, the weight of her small head on my chest, already I’d soothed and fed and washed her forty days running.  That other mother gave life, I gave only touch, warmth, comfort.  I couldn’t help it; I fell in love, it happens like that, quickly, without thought.  I didn’t know how it felt to be someone’s mother.  When I couldn’t become pregnant, I cried for days.  My insides felt soft and hollow, like an empty purse.  This little girl loves me, I know she does.  She reflects a rainbow back to my eyes, in her smallest toe resides a perfect universe.  I lie next to her at night, breathing the rich, salty fragrance of her hair, feeling her body growing, expanding to meet mine, and over our private nest flows time, but for as long…