A Magic Trick

I.

I missed her C-section; out of town.
So when I got back and saw her in the hospital bed,
that particular elated, exhausted look on her face,
the tiny creature resting on her belly,
it was like a magic trick had occurred.
Look away for a moment,
and what was inside is now outside.

II.

Later, I thought,
this is what it must be for so many. A magic trick.
They who were not there do not know the visceral nature of it; how could they?
They were not in the OR, watching the slice of each layer by glistening layer,
and they were not in the labor room.
They did not feel that pain—
that pain a knife
that both lends sharpness to the memory
and severs you from it.
How lucky for us, to have witnessed it. To have felt it.
How lucky for them, to have been spared.