Batnadiv HaKarmi, Primal Point, 2013 (Artist Website)
Oil and gesso on unprimed canvas
90 x 90 cm
We aren’t born with a set of molars to carve our way
into the light, but God
must’ve used tusks to cut into herself, to make space
for a shadow of gum, a world
that exists only in lacking.
We are born in a flash,
under a flickering orb, acute sun. A bare bulb,
like the uterus upside down,
writes Olds. Light—
not bright, but deep.
& God said & said & said—
let there be.
I want to tell my daughter she talks
herself to sleep,
but I’ll wait till she understands. Then,
she’ll open her mouth
& gleam a thousand teeth at me, the lamps
she grew on her own.
Then, like a god, she’ll make light
out of words.
Her red curls bend with the river, shine
like gold in the mine of life.
I won’t tell her about the digging,
that her teeth will fall out, how
others will take their place.
Infants are meant to suck
their mothers, painlessly. No fangs
on nipple, just soft mouth. Rivulets
of red flesh—a cave.
& the babies who refuse the breast?
You held onto
the bottle for dear life, I’ll tell her.
Dear, it’s your life.