Unborn, Day 28

Your replicating cells divide my life. Books warns I may not love you at first, but how not love this ordinary magic cells wild with separate lives? Though you trespass here, I welcome you. I succumbed to whims that vanished with morning, appeared on the crest of decisions and stayed, wandering in the ark. Tonight … Continue reading “Unborn, Day 28”

Your replicating cells divide
my life. Books warns I may not
love you at first, but how not love
this ordinary magic
cells wild with separate lives?

Though you trespass here,
I welcome you. I succumbed to whims
that vanished with morning,
appeared on the crest of decisions
and stayed, wandering in the ark.

Tonight you grow as you will never
grow again. Like a lizard.
undifferentiated cells: leg and hand,
primitive heart and gills.
You are a menagerie of prehistoric
change and necessity.

All this day I have been sick
with the life of you, who are a stranger
to me, distant as Neptune,
mysterious as Juno, small nova
on my horizon, swelling
toward your hour.

July 1989

Author: Janice

A creative. Lifelong Marylander. After many odd jobs of adolescence and college, have always worked as a writer and published essays, op-eds, articles, and poetry in national news media and small presses. Collection of poetry, "Saturday at the Gym", about boxing, aging, and motherhood; collection of artwork and poetry, "What Are Mothers For?" On the verge of an empty nest for the first time in 30 years, my question is: What am I for?