Did you know you were the Universe?

Did you know you were the Universe, gorgeous?
No, that’s no ad for shamanic practices
Or some “become a better version of yourself” sham.
So plainly, one Friday, in the a.m.,
The go-getter turns the begetter of galaxies.
Genuine. Primal. Flawless.

Could you’ve expected, checking in at your ward as told,
Trying to bargain with the dreadful inevitableness,
How you would frame with gold in your memory the flash
Of them extracting not your cry from beneath your flesh
When every cell is at the point of busting with tenderness
And your cheek muscles contract in a smile you cannot control?

Time stamp: nine thirty-one.
Length: fifty. Weight: two point nine four zero.
Ten out of ten, perfect Apgar score.
A fragile, undeserved, most priceless gift one could wish for —
My girl! Gaze still otherworldly, a cosmic hollow,
A blue abyss where no bottom can be found.

And while medics above you perform their rites, motions elegant,
The cultural layer’s ripped off — not just the cut open tissue —
All of those things reasonable, Apollonian.
Did you even know how much of you was chthonian?
Funny how that superficial stuff you thought was you
Now feels so nonsensical and irrelevant.

World reassembles. Square one, places to go,
As this new sacred mystery in your heart surges:
The pre-verbal, unutterable, chordate grace
When the weight of whole world on your chest they place.
Did you know you were the Universe, gorgeous?
- No. So you knew — and never told me so?