These Eggs
I carry them up old stairways
into unfamiliar rooms, I lie down
with them on the blue and white bedspread,
and talk to myself openly about the future.
These eggs survive my hatred of my mother,
of the way she placed a hand
on her belly, as if it was the belly
of a stranger.
Hatred of the legs that opened,
the body that let me go
alone with my own body.
I wanted to be born from my father,
without blood, without trouble.
I carry these sticky flowers inside me
without feeling their weight,
I do not fall when they fall.
I do not know what their shadows look like.
One day I’ll have a child who may hate me.
For my sake two people lay down
and touched bones.
And I’ll lie down with light
on the long bones of my thighs.
I’ll marry my shoulder to a man’s shoulder.
I’ll live my life around
the uncreated dark
of these eggs.
Rita Gabis
from The Wild Field
Alice James Books, 1994
.