The author of this poem was born seconds / minutes / hours / days / months / years ago!
The formatting for this piece gets messed up when viewed on mobile, but turning the screen horizontal should probably fix it.
The way you told it, I arrived early, when
your windows reflected black mirrors through
which streetlights beckoned you forward.
seconds ago I was heavy
in your aching belly, reluctant
to exist. Even now I hesitate to abandon
the body—instead it limps forward slow
and unwieldy, trailing oil and serous fluid.
Each minute beyond the prior I shed the dead
weight. You must remember more than I do. I have only
secondary rumors of your child, her imagined
picture on the windowsill, where she is young and
happy forever. The rest is fog; when I breathe her
in, she frosts my lungs. For hours you have raised
an eidolon—sang to her, bought her clothes, drove
her to school and taught her multiplication while I,
neither tied to the earth nor flying, slept and waited.
I can’t tell you which of these days I woke on,
nor when my cloud double, growing
ever translucent, could no longer be held.
months she perfected her humanity and I,
unmothered and animal new, escape her each day. You
will not find your baby's remains in me so keep looking. Sorry
I'm not the girl you've loved for years.
I heard she was a wonderful daughter.