Great Mother, I wish to be reborn. I wish to come into this life bloody and vibrant, squalling and new. I wish to let myself be held and comforted, to feel your heartbeat pulsing through my body and know we are yet connected. I wish my words to disintegrate into helpless cries of pure need, and from them to forge a new language, one based on the understanding that my needs matter and they will be met. I wish to stare into your eyes, to know you at last as Person and not just Home; to see myself reflected there and, through your gaze of knowing, to know myself. I wish to see how much I matter to you so I can matter to me. I wish to feel Mother Love, to open myself to that love without the shadow of expectations, disappointments, punishments, codependency, and betrayal. I wish to see you as you and still be me, and both of us be enough. I wish to rewrite history so that this is what I knew from the beginning, but I wish to keep all I have learned. I wish to wrap my tiny fingers around one of yours, to know where I end and you begin, and for it not to matter. I wish to talk and you to listen. I wish to transmit to you the entire story of my existence and my unfolding understanding of what it means. I wish for you to hold it as though a star had fallen from heaven into the palm of your hand. I wish to learn from you how to hold the hard things gently, how to let the rain fall through me and be nurtured by it, how to keep my eyes on the clouds so I never miss a rainbow. Great Mother, I wish for eyes that search for beauty, ears that hear the cries of pain, hands that seek connection, feet that are firmly rooted, a mouth that speaks the truth of what I know, a brain that understands and honors the complicated miracle of me, and a body strong enough to hold it all together. Mother, I wish to be more than a lump of clay.