Day 14 anna kiss

the pregnant pause

every dream
grows red with
meaty blood,
full up in
miscarried globules
and heart-shaped placenta

the belly ballooned
steadily by degrees
up and up
fingers feel into flesh
the firm, rounded edge
which writes the shapes of
knees and backs and rounded crown

the babe blossoms
in my brain,
slowly unfurled
from tadpole
to floppy limbs
and too-flexible joints.

so it is a strange revelation -
this empty womb,
its depths feel too hollow
and too small
it is vacant
and lacking in space
for any sort of fullness.
nothing here.

and yet i rub
the skin below
the navel,
searching out the origin,
finding no one home but me.