Bundle of Joy

These days, every little thing is a terror
even though I go nowhere
and that is a problem because I think
the fury must be me.

Somewhere, I imagine
a woman is giving birth
and I once did, too
and it was hard

and easy all at once—pain
and then a tearing
I’ve been trying to correct
ever since.

Birthing peels you open
so you can let someone else
take your place
but no one gives you instructions

for how to live in the slipstream
or what to say in the morning
to the woman in the mirror
who has violets blooming

under her eyes
and a wedge of old-fashioned rage
stuck in her heart
like a cartoon arrow

and no way to pull it out.
Mothers are born, too
and mothers are made
but no one considers

what kind of beast it takes
to make a mother
or that the beast is you.