We hugged at the departure gate, waifs with bird chests clinking like wood, boyish, long skirted figurines waiting to grow into our hunger. When they left, I was twelve years old and swollen with the heat of waiting. Amel’s hardened nipples push through the paisley of her blouse, minarets calling men to worship. The summer my cousins return from Nairobi, we sit in a circle by the oak tree in my aunt’s garden. You were with her, holding a bag of dates to your chest, heard her let out a deep moan when she saw how much you looked like him. Last week, she saw him driving the number 18 bus, his cheek a swollen drumlin, a vine scar dragging itself across his mouth. When your mother confessed I’ve never been touched like that before, the friend laughed, mouth bloody with grapes, then plunged a hand between your mother’s legs. That same evening she visited a friend, a girl who fermented wine illegally in her bedroom. On waking she found her dress was wet and sticking to her stomach, half moons bitten into her thighs. She held her breath for so long that she blacked out. Your mother was sixteen when he first kissed her. She remembers hearing this from your uncle, then going to your bedroom and lying down on the floor. The first boy to kiss your mother later raped women when the war broke out. I did not beg him to stay because I was begging God that he would not leave. What Your Mother Told You After Your Father Left I have my mother’s mouth and my father’s eyes on my face they are still together. Mother, loosen my tongue or adorn me with a lighter burden. 10) Produced in the United Kingdom Published by the mouthmark series, 2011 a pamphlet series of flipped eye publishing All Rights Reserved Cover Design by Effi Ibok Series Design © flipped eye publishing, 2006 First Edition Copyright © Warsan Shire 2011 Print ISBN: 978-1-90 Teaching My Mother How To Give Birth mouthmark series (No. Literary pointillism on a funked-out canvas Teaching My Mother How To Give Birth by Warsan Shire

Teaching my mother how to give birth