She was the first place I learned what it meant to carry, endure, and remain.

Long before I had a language for it, I understood responsibility.

I understood how to hold others without asking to be held.

When she returned to the earth in 2010, she did not leave me empty.

She left me with a life that still had to be lived

and a voice I did not know how to use.

Mary's Child Writes is what grew from that void.

If you have ever been the one who held everything together,

If you are coming back to yourself after being what everyone else needed.

You are already a part of this house.

- Mary's Child