We’ve had a very difficult and traumatic past couple days. We’re all okay and home now; God has brought us through and provided His grace every step of the way.
I wrote this in the thick of it. Sometimes choppy poetry is what comes out easier than a fluid journal in times when things are hard and hardly make sense. I will tell the story of everything soon, but for now, here’s this:
The colorfully painted walls
Do little to distract from the
Cold
Unfeeling
Loneliness
Of a hospital room
Someone enters
Again.
Our space that’s not really ours.
Will they wake her up
For the tenth time
Or the twentieth?
Another unfinished nap?
It’s housekeeping this time
(An odd name for a
Place
That’s not a house
And far from home)
But my cynicism lightens
As the little woman dashes about
Quietly she says “sh, sh, sh”
Again and again
As she cleans
The (already clean) room
Having seen Willa asleep
She had smiled
Knowingly
She reminds me of my grandmother
Or my first grade teacher
Both of whom also understood
The importance
Of sleeping babies
Cynicism or optimism
Apathy or empathy
Either are options now
I can hate the sterile room,
The injustice of our captivity in it
And let it all depress me
Or see life and light everywhere
And let it uplift me
The lively, shushing cleaning lady
The vibrant city outside of the
Large, clear window
My blissfully unaware baby
She startles awake at
Another sound
Looks at me
And settles right back down
Secure whether home or here
Jennifer Blacklock 
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