ISSUE: Summer 2010
Mama, you know a mother’s
supposed to be there when a cry
flies out of her hungry child,
but you are nodding in the corner,
riding your high, the plastic
stained with our blood;
and this baby will learn
to understand the simple
brokenness in all people—
the things we can’t rely on,
the chain of desire, and sweetness,
the high, the high, the high.
Such a terrible lesson for a baby
to learn: the lie of mothering.
