Title: Mother’s Milk: Poems in Search of Heavenly Mother
Author: Rachel Hunt Steenblik, with Ashley Mae Hoiland, illustrator
Publisher: BCC Press
Year published: 2017
Genre: Poetry
2017 AML Poetry Award
(Reviewed by Rebecca Bateman)
I remember balking in my youth when, on the radio, some crazy-burn-your-bra feminist had the audacity to refer to God as “She.” What kind of blasphemy was this? In all my learning, God was male. That’s what I was taught.
But what did I know?
What did I know?
What did I know?
For Mormons, there was an Unspoken. If there is a Father, there is also a Mother Who Art in Heaven.
And what of Her?
Time and struggle, growth and progress found me wanting Her, wanting to fill that seeming void. Especially in the most heart-breaking moments. When I came across this blog post, I felt my heart resonate and cry out for my Mother: “Where the hell are you?”
And several months later, I found her.
I found her in these simple, candid, heart-felt poems and thoughts that, perhaps every mother has whispered, but Rachel Hunt Steenblik had the courage and tenderness to vocalize and write down.
The Great She Is, II
She is the God of
Sarah, Rebecca,
and Rachel.
She covenants with Her daughters.
There’s nothing earth-shaking in these writings (What am I saying?! They are wholly ground-breaking!), they are pure crystals of maternal divine that you will perhaps recognize from your own mother, or perhaps from your own motherhood. She is a mother. And She is more.
What the Mother Taught Me
Creation is
more than
procreation.
It is snow, birds,
trees, moon,
and song.
I needed them. I needed to feel the connection to a Heavenly Mother could be found in the very feelings I have already experienced with my own children. I am like Her. And She is like me.
Choose Wisdom
The Mother
mentored Eve,
to choose Wisdom.
When she did,
the Mother
rejoiced.
The Hour She Learned She was God
When Her hour
came, She prayed
to be delivered,
before remembering
the Deliverer
was She.
Tree Rings
If we cut Her open,
we could count Her rings
and know Her age,
but we’d also learn Her hunger –
the years She put Her roots down deep
and threw Her arms to the sky,
and how She carried them
with grace.
Rebecca worked in the Utah State House of Representatives, helped to organize the 2015 Parliament Of World Religions, and is currently the Executive Director for LDS Earth Stewardship. She spends her spare time with interfaith work, mentoring a refugee family, and serving on the Board of the Golden Rule Project.