march 5th 

march comes in like a lion 

that old saying, it rattles 

in my head as does my breath 

in my tired, burning lungs 

i drag in air, not-enough, no; 

outside, light cracks the night,  

as rain falls and thunder rolls and  

i am reminded of drowning 

in the dark, we two; my mother 

holding me, and as i struggle 

i am reminded of a summer past. 

she tells me again when i ask 

her mother, holding her up- straight- 

safe in the embrace of her arms 

to weather the suffocation of 

exhausted bursts of too-little air 

they two are united, there and now, 

in the shared hope of mothers 

that their daughters may rest & 

breath, with them at their backs