Little House, Redacted

in which Caroline Ingalls and I both know something true

---

Behind the Poem:

I was inspired to jump on this month’s Exhale Creativity exercise of making a redacted poem (also known as a black-out poem). I started by flipping the pages on recently published novels on my shelf, but I couldn’t figure out how to boil those essences down.

When my eyes fell on one of my childhood favorites, Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder, I felt I needed to give this a try. I let the worn spine guide the way and allowed it to fall open naturally. It landed on the chapter “Two Big Bears.”

As I read the passage about Ma gathering Laura quickly into the house after mistaking a bear for their cow (and slapping the bear on the shoulder!) I was drawn to discovering what Ma and I have in common. I started reading the Little House series as a young girl, and now I am a mother. I couldn’t help but rest my eyes on her line, “Pa had not come home yet. He didn’t come.” It made me think of how I have grown, from protected, to protector.

How many nights have we waited for our sweet Dad to return from a deployment or training?

How many nights have I mustered the courage to tuck sweet loves in tightly, and held my breath?

Trying to be the safe place myself, even as I rock in the turmoil of worry for not only Ryan being gone, but for the fate of the world.

But as mothers have done for centuries, I pull back up, I hang on.

---

This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Redacted."