(The story of a woman who gave life, and for that was exiled)
Epigraph:
In her are Eve and Lilith's might,
Demeter, Gaia, Pachamama,
She brings her gifted kids to light,
To them, she’s simply known as Mama.
The first
time she gave birth, she was eighteen. Alone. Without a wedding, without
promises, without curses for the man she would never see again. She simply left
home for one night—and returned with a new life inside her. Her father turned
away from her. Her mother wept as if at a funeral. But she did not cry. She did
not rebel. She did not explain. She only stroked her belly through her shirt
and whispered something warm to it, as if talking to someone she had known for
a long time.
A year
later, she had two. Then three. And then—five at once, when twins were born,
followed by another. The people could not bear it. They called her a whore, for
with each child, she seemed to challenge every barren woman in their small,
suffocatingly envious town. Where doctors could not help and prayers bore no
fruit, she was as fertile as the earth after rain. And no one could understand
why it was her.
For she was
beautiful—truly beautiful, the kind they write poems about. And wise—not in the
sense of exams, but with a quiet, persistent wisdom. Men sensed this. It was
these qualities that drew them to her, but none of them ever stayed. Because
she wouldn't let them, disappearing after each night like a shadow, leaving a
man with a memory in his heart, and her body with a seed. And then she would
give birth again. And again, alone.
The women could not forgive her for a single child. Not a single smile. Not a single note of happiness in her children's eyes. Because they had none of their own.
By the time
she turned thirty-five, she had eleven children. The eldest were almost adults.
One painted divinely, and his masterpieces began to be bought by private
collectors and the world's largest art galleries. Another sang, and record
labels fought with each other for the right to sign a contract with her. A
third knew mathematics like a god, as if he had lived within it since birth.
Without his calculations, houses, shopping malls, airplanes, and spaceships
could not be built. Scientific expeditions and geological surveys were
impossible without them. Her children were not all the same. But each was a
miracle. And everyone knew: the miracle was born of love, not of a man. It was
created by the mother.
On her last
day in the town, they came to her house. Not with pitchforks, but with a
decision to exile her with no right of return. For depravity and immorality,
for witchcraft and for laughing in a time of sorrow, for her children, for a
beauty that was not theirs. For the fact that she could—and she did.
She did not
argue. She packed a bag. Woke the younger ones. The others were already on
their feet. And they left for another city. They settled in a house on another
street. And there, it all began anew.
Years
passed. Sometimes decades. People did not know where she was. Only in the
newspapers did articles with photographs appear: "Olympic swimming
champion: son of a hero-mother who raised thirteen children"; "Young
female engineer invents a new type of ecological turbine—she does not know her
father, but is grateful to her mother for everything"; "Composer of
the Year writes a requiem dedicated to the woman no one called by name, but
everyone called Mom."
And some of
her men would recognize themselves in those faces in the photos. Or rather, a
copy of themselves. But it was already too late, for she had always disappeared
from their lives. Forever. Without letters, claims, or alimony.
The
children grew up. And they carried a light within them. Each radiated the light
of love. True and unconditional, given by the touch of a hand, a lullaby, and a
soft voice saying before sleep: "You were not born by accident. You
are the future. I was waiting for you."
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