Lucian Mattison is a U.S.-Argentinian Poet and translator living in Oakland. His poem "Umbilical" can be found in his 3rd full length collection of poetry "Curare."
Umbilical
All wilderness
arrives unwieldy,
a fish beaten
against rock. What’s left
is nothing
more than a form
of beauty, acceptance
of discomfort
in human
imposition—everything
electrical desert,
ablutions, and barcodes—
nature no longer
completely nature.
Returning is never so
simple as winding
the umbilical
like a garden hose.
Will ages and age
is willing to concede
to this motion.
Teeth sinking
into the belly
of a smaller creature,
I’ll never accept or forget
my life is only evidence
of one larger wade
of mother
out into the world—
the instant I break
skin, a dolphin fin
appears, glides
a shallow arc on the edge
of her consciousness.