Cesarean moonchild

As far as i could remember, the purpose of my existence was to win a prize. The nature of this prize is still a mystery to me, although my parents have always had a clear view of it, it involves success and conformity. I was to succeed, and succeed successfully, within the confines of our cultural values down to the color of my hair, my tolerance to hot food, my posture. Before I was even alive my life was mapped out in painstaking precision, and it crushed my will while I lay stoic in the womb.

Apparently I developed a suicidal tendency before I was born because the doctors had to cut my out of my mother's gut and untangle me from my umbilical noose. My parents would lay in bed at night and quietly rage at the misfortune of their marriage, murmuring hollow agreements about my future. I felt my mother's desires like a hot iron against my back, whispering hungry secrets into my fetal brain,

"You will be such a wonderful daughter, I will raise you like a flower, soft and yielding. You are my beautiful obedient, braided child. Perhaps you will go to medical school, but if that is too difficult I am willing to compromise because I love you so. So and so and everyone will know you are mine, and you won't be like those others that flock with the gossipers and toss their hair at the boys. No, you'll be my porcelain daughter and I will raise you as such. Maybe you can take over my dream to be an artist, and everyone will marvel at your ingenuity. They will see."

Even as I floated innocuously about her maternal cavern, I was confused at her dialogue. I felt that she wasn't talking to me, but rather at one of the unfertilized eggs in her ovaries. Whatever it was that summoned such fervent motherly love, I wanted it badly and convinced myself that I would go through great lengths to earn it. My prospective life spanned out in front of me like a distant pool of water, waiting to be perfectly pierced with a perfect dive 400 meters up. Mother, I don't want to jump. Please mother let me stay on this platform, the music is lovely and from what I can fathom these emotions are truly exquisite. But I'm afriad of the fear you so innocently deny. What if i lose my balance in the air or my head explodes from the impact of water or pressure underneath? I heard that you can lose an eardrum if you hit the water at the wrong angle, and then I really will go about my entire life losing balance. Balance is important, you know, because it helps coordination and mobilitiy, it's a talent, really. And with it comes grace and sanity. And stability like electrons and photons in the elements that my body is formed with. I was there for a split microsecond, like a blue flicker and then I became a billion atoms, multiplying like my soul was in a hurry to manifest into this motal realm, and through the whole process I remember feeling such overwhelming purpose in every animated atom...and balance. The molecules were in deliberate accord every chemical interaction. You wanna know something funny mom? I thought I was going to turn into fire, like the consuming, breathing Father, and it wasn't until my head formed that I grasped this dimension in my being. I am water, like the Spirit! I am a human, female, sojourner, a creature of space, time, will, faith in a perishable container.

So you see,
I have this one chance
and it's my life,
so couldn't you let me stay
here for a little while longer?