新媒网 · 跨境数据社区

Sorry, Im not available right now. Im writing a nervous system. Im the steady hum beneath his sleep, the rhythm whispering to his tiny body; "the world is safe. the tenderness will stay with you. you are held in a way you'll carry forever" I rock and sway, not because Im trapped, but because Im teaching his bones, what it feels like to be held. His breath is learning mine. His heart is syncing to the sound of my own. This is not stillness. This is building. Each moment of skin to skin, each quiet hour with his cheek pressed against my chest, is laying down pathways, teaching his tiny body how to return to calm, to carry the memory of warmth long after my arms are gone. His breath comes fast and shallow, his body still learning the shapes of the world, so I slow mine, offering my calm like an anchor, until his tiny lungs soften into the rhythm of me. He don't know yet how to feel safe. So I let him borrow my stillness. He don't know yet how to carry peace in his own skin. So I pour it into him, through every sway of my hips, every hush, every heartbeat steady beneath his ear. Even when my back aches. Even when my arms burn. Even when I ache to set him down. I stay because Im not just holding a baby, Im ledning him my wholeness, so he can one day build his own. This isn't the pause of life. This is life being written into the cells of a brand new human. And one day, when he steady himself without me, Ill remember this season, how my body became the blueprint for a lifetime of calm. - Isobel Benesch