Unitarian Universalist Sermon on Birth Part 1: Opening Words

Our Mother’s Body Is the Earth by Mary McAnally
From the anthology The Book of Birth Poetry edited by Charlotte Otten

Our mother’s body is the earth,
her aura is the air, her spirit
is in the middle, round like an egg,
and she contains all good things in herself,
like a honeycomb.
She squats and the rivers flow;
her breasts are the hills,
her nipples the trees.
Her breath scatters leaves
on the shifting sands of her belly,
and her knees roll out caverns and canyons below.
Her menses make the ocean floor shift,
and tidal waves proclaim her pain.
When we, her children, return to her,
in ash or in dust,
her flesh is scarred with accepting us back,
and her intestines growl at our death.
Mountains erupt with her agony
and pour us back into the sea
to hiss and spume her convulsions.

Note: The final word of the poem is actually "orgasm", but I couldn't bring myself to say the word "orgasm" in a church service, even a Unitarian Universalist one. -Amy Polk