Posted in Poetry

For the Sun Child

By Noel Ihebuzor


Inert the child lies,

bathed in blood,

still and silent,


the silence of the ward

broken by the mother’s aching sobs



long labour had drained her,

almost turning her blood blue,

till eventually the blade

 brought relief and pain,


baby was curled, drained

 cord twisted and twined

around a narrow neck,

life slowly choked by the connection

that had linked them

and nourished,


the emptying evening drags

as she sits and sobs

imagining how this life

she had known in kicks and movements

would have looked

had the cord that nourished

not also extinguished

pondering this mystery of failed procreation

where lives are twined forever,

scars remain after departures,


sadness slowly strangling her soul,

like a cord, the pains of an empty womb

 now more acute

as her soul bleeds

above and below the lines of suture.


****For the SunChild who lost her baby, and who felt that the sun had gone out! Be strong, Tashie, Ndo!




22 thoughts on “For the Sun Child

  1. Oh! So sad, so very, very sad. Heartbreaking. Preventable. Horrible. I cannot “like” this. I have been there, on that bed, under a different knife, in another country where this outcome was prevented. Oh, the waste of life. The pain. My sympathies to the mother.

    1. Giving life should be a choice and not a chance thing, and society has a duty to make sure that a woman who makes the choice is supported to see that “Nine months” end not in pain but in joy and gain.Advocacy is required to push this.

      1. Oh, Lord, yes. Too late for this child, this poor young mother, but not too late for others. I do not, cannot, understand any other mindset than what you have expressed here. The process of life-bringing should not end in death as often as it does.

      2. Thanks so much for the poem. it is so appreciated. I am much better now. And thanks to all who did comment on this topic. I have accepted it with good faith. God knows best and the one that will stay will come soonest. Amen!

  2. So heartbreaking, so painful so much grief. You said this so poignantly, Noel and I can imagine the agony she went through. As we normally say in Ghana during such times, the good Lord knows best. My heart goes out to the Sun Child.

  3. So poignant … Very painful.
    I have a sister- inlaw who had a still birth because of pregnancy induced hypertension! Eight month. We shown the pictures of the lifeless body.
    It’s still haunts me
    The mother is on antidepressants
    The Sunchild….

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