ON THE CUSP OF THE MILLENNIUM

by Pam Connell | More from this Blogger

16 Jul 2008 12:06 AM

A young woman gave birth alone

Strangers surround her, hold you first

In the bright glare of a sterile room

One room

In a large hospital

In a populous country

In a huge world.

Yet fireworks lit the skies all over the world the night you were born

There were prayer vigils and champagne and parties to end all parties.

All the hospital staff know and remember you, Happy Jade, jewel of the future;

First baby born at that hospital in the New Millennium.

A Korean friend remembers a news story about the first New Year baby--

Was it you? I don't think so. The situation in that little room did not call for public celebration in society's eyes

But with his marvelous sense of humor, God had the whole world doing fireworks for you

And your birthday is a national holiday every year-in both your countries, birth and adopted.

I was thinking about babies on the night you were born

Nursing my older baby, almost two years old,

Wondering if he was nursing for the last time, Thinking about the new sibling he soon would have. I sat in semi-darkness

A peaceful silence that the occasional firecracker could not disturb

As the still night became the new day, a day which already was across

the ocean, across the Date Line

A morning where you were tended by loving hands reaching into your incubator

As you continued growing in a bright new world

I would not know about you for another five months

I would not see you until the very last month of that new year

But I felt the stillness inside me, One babe drawing strength suckling at my breast-- I was fully in the moment with him,

But somehow my thoughts were across the ocean and in the future as well,

Wishing strength to another babe, one others must tend on behalf of me for now

My strength drew strength from thoughts of you,

The babe destined to span centuries and continents as my thoughts spanned the ocean.

Learn more about Pam Connell

Pam Connell is a mother of three by both birth and adoption. She has worked in education, child care, social services, ministry and journalism.

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