10/30: To the Treacherous Bit of Technology that Ate a Poem I was Beginning to Love

Like a man
I stroked a spark
into your glitch of a memory
Trusted you to keep it
You vessel
You well
You empty thing
Useful only
To be poured into
Transcribed upon
Prettied with my logic
Adorned with a narrative
of World history, as I remember it
Without it you were unattractive
Vapid before I branded you
Dead before I plugged you in
And you
Ungrateful bitch
Hinted at safe keeping
Absorbed the sleeping fetus
Once my back was turned
Dissolved it as if it would not be missed
When I left you alone for one minute
When I found out what you did,
I searched you to find it
The whites of ur eyes, a blank screen with no iris
Stared back at me, unable to blink
You want me to think it was an accident
A miscarriage
But it was too clean to believe
Where is the trail of blood
The alphabet of body parts
In pile at your feet, still warm
From your body
Prove to me you didn't dig in
Nearly elbow deep
Wire hanger ready
Scrape, scrape, scraping away
At what I made

You will never admit what you did
You keep secrets, just like a woman

8/30: To The Girl Who Urged My Niece to Have a Fourth Baby to "Make It Even"

To The Girl Who Urged My Niece to Have a Fourth Baby to "Make It Even"

Until nine months ago
You didn't know
You had a uterus
Or that people could
Grow there
When you first learned
That your homecoming date
Had planted an actual
human being between
your legs, you threw up
in the kitchen sink
And lit yourself another cigarette
You called your friends on the phone
And together, you all
went to the mall to buy
the tiniest pair of Jordans
That you could find
On some days
You stared at the wall
And didn't talk
Terrified and amazed
At finally realizing
Your life long dream
Of owning a living doll
You are still young
But that is no reason
To be so stupid

Sleeping infant in crook of arm
Freshly harvested from your body
Cesarean incision marking a boundary
Below which boys should not
Be allowed for a good long while

You need to sit down
Go somewhere and learn
To be quiet
Pay attention
Only to the needs of your child
Not other people's business
Your advice is useless

Children are not
interchangeable, individual
accessories to be paired into sets
They are not home furnishings
Salt and pepper shakers
Book ends
Something you once borrowed
From a friend and forgot to give back
Discarded, damaged
Property
Your body is not a factory
Do not confuse your birth canal
With a conveyor belt
No good can come
From that sort of reasoning

It would not be
The least bit surprising to me
If you tilted your head to one side
Or the other,
And an avalanche
Of dumb ideas came
Tumbling out of your ear