Finalist

 

Wet Nurse

 

She harbors us in wispy tendrils,

           Wraps us in lilies, swaddles us in cattails.

She has made a nest, a cradle,

           In her ripe and watery bed.

She sings to us her ancient lullabies:

          The screech-screech owl, the willow’s lament;

She has made her alien tongue

           Soft melody to young, green ears.

She rocks us in languid water

           Churned by currents, swirled by fish.

She has found us solitude in strangeness

           Soothing us in eeriness.

She is not our mother.

           Our mother was the meadows, the forests.

She did not grant us life.

           Life was made by the turbulent seas.

We came to her already made;

           She took us in and remade herself.

She has forged a home for her invaders,

           Changed her shape to welcome us;

Like the children we no longer are

           We forget we are become hers.

---

Christina Welsch, age 16

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

LSU Lab School

Teacher: Connie McDonald