The love that once held me now holds my children too.
I carry these moments, memories, and parts of my mother within me.
Painfully aware it’s a privilege many are not given-
to have so much as time, 
the presence and connection with my mother by birth.
But how beautiful to know that my children have known her,
been held, and loved, and shaped by her.
And that these parts of her that they have known
will live on within them forever, too.
Three generations, I’ll still say-
though some may see it differently.
But family is not confined to biology.
for love has the audacity- 
the outrageous audacity,
to break the mold and make room,
for hearts that were never meant to meet.
Ask me what it’s worth, as we surrender our hearts to the tide,
with quiet hope and crushing fear,
longing to keep birth families whole.
But oh, she is worth it,
and they’re worth it-
a hundred times over.
Yet we honor, too, those who stand in the in-between,
becoming family in ways none of us could have foreseen.
Never replacing, never erasing,
standing beside, for as long as we are given.
And while we wait, and watch the future unfold
I’ll have the audacity- 
a mother’s relentless audacity,
to hold grief and joy in the same breath,
to hold on to the beauty of this moment,
watching her grow, knowing
the love that once held me, now holds my children too.