The Voice

Just before we’re born, pushed out

of the embryonic space we’ve grown accustomed to,

dark and wet and warm, just before, we hear

in our heads amid the muted instructions to push

and our mothers’ birthing grunts and screams,

just before we’re forced to leave, resisting it,

this voice, sounding, rings clearly in our heads,

in our ears newly formed, speaking in the only language

we can truly know, truly understand, our own language,

foreign even to the voices we hear from without

now loud around us, our own voice clearly heard

again, once again in our heads, in our own language

loud above our own crying out, all we know to do,

pulled as we are from the dark and wet and warm,

the space where we floated, softly tucked and safe,

pushed out now as we are into the cold unknown,

harshly lit, mishandled, pushed and pulled

to experience this thing called living;

and the voice we hear, just before, before we’re born,

and after, clear above our own voice crying out,

that same voice we hear years later, softly, many times,

in our own language, known and understood,

in other pushings and pullings, resisting,

and the voice, as now, reminds us, in our heads,

clearly ringing, sounding, “don’t forget to breathe.”