This is a poem that really touched me. I want to share it here. I remember hearing when I was growing up that there were women who'd come to your house, they were bathed, scrubbed down and fed very well, then they would nurse your baby. Mothers didn't want to take the time, or make the effort or maybe like the poem says, they were afraid this would damage their bodies. Even in recent times I've had friends who say that breastfeeding felt "dirty" and that it should be left in the history books for the aborigines or the cave people. For me, breastfeeding was one of the sweetest things of motherhood. I wish every woman was willing to and able to nurse her own babies!
“You were afraid to nurse your young
lest fallen breast offend your master’s sight
and he should flee to firmer loveliness.
And so you passed them, your children, on to me.
Flesh that was your flesh and blood that was your blood
drank the sustenance of life from me.
And as I gave suckle I knew I nursed my own child’s enemy.
I could have lied,
told you your child was fed till it was dead of hunger.
But I could not find the heart to kill orphaned innocence.
For as it fed, it smiled and burped and gurgled with content
and as for color knew no difference.
Yes, in that first while
I kept your sons and daughters alive.
But when they grew strong in blood and bone
that was of my milk
you taught them to hate me.
Put your decay in their hearts and upon their lips
so that strength that was of myself
turned and spat upon me,
despoiled my daughters, and killed my sons.
You know I speak true.“
(Beah Richards, excerpt from “A Black Woman Speaks of White Womanhood")
Brenda Koro's photo.