Monday, February 22, 2010

Breast is Best


I sleep in some days when Zephyr wakes too early. On days when he wakes too early, after his dad tries in vain to sate and soothe with a bottle, I finally wake from my hurried sleep to rescue Zeph from the indignity of a rubber mother, and I arrive with my warm breast.

He latches on with greedy aplomb. After panicked panting "ohthankgod" through the first moment, my milk releases and his suckling slows to a slower, more gastronomical pace.

My little gourmand savors each sip, his free hand tracing an unknown pattern across my sternum, his tiny fingers lingering at the seam of my bra. He strums across my breast carefully, deliberately, with apparent specificity.

He sometimes pulls away suddenly gasping, arching his neck and back gracefully as he comes up for air (eyes closed tight, tiny lips still pursed), then he dives back in for another taste. He wobbles his head back and forth like a mad puppy playing with a bone - mouth agape, splashing his cheeks in buttery milk, and uttering a low grunt - and then settles back into a warm sigh, falling into comfortable slumber.

4 comments:

  1. I knew you were going to love this part the best. Just reading this makes me long for another. My favorite times were the middle of the night feedings when there was no place or nothing else that I should have been doing but seeing to their needs...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sheer poetry, Heather. And I think you've captured something here that even us childless folk can appreciate about the experience of motherhood.

    ReplyDelete

Yay! Thanks for saying nice stuff about my baby.