maybe the 5th or 7th or 9th
or some other time if my body is playing
copy-cat,
motherhood oozes from me and away,
like a confused bird
migrating twelve times a year.

there comes a feeling of loss
with nothing being lost at all -
a baby girl, dropping a baby doll -
it's the idea of the thing,
losing not what was,
but what could have been.

One year, some month
on the 5th or 7th or 9th
or some other day
Motherhood will stand her ground.

Nine months later, we'll hope May,
April having been filled with showers,
and what could have been will be
a baby - mine - yours - ours.
Playing house is my  idea of absolution.

We will build four walls
of desperation,
one roof of hope,
and a small, white, fence of maybe's

and only when the baby is choking me,
when your mistress-called-work takes you away,
and the puppy has been served up
in place of trust,

will we understand we have not been playing...
we were not playing and our sins are all
that would grow in the goodly garden
of the four-walled house of hope.
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