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Stillbirth

Labour was normal, a birth, like any other;

But long, for bearing nothing but a stone;

Pushign a stone of pain uphill for hours

Gasping for breath

Hope did not die till later.

I had been heavy, a stagnant pool, no stir

No beat of heart, hands. Then

This cataclysm that seemed to presage life,

But, at the end, no cry.

Under the half-death of the chloroform

I heard the nurse laugh, joking with the doctor,

Thinking I could not hear. I knew, then

And a weak rage rose in my throat

That it was mine they looked at and held light.

I would have snatched it from them

Carried it in my mouth to my lair

With animal groans, and licked it back to life.

They took it from me, told me, all's for the best

And shut it in a box. What else to do

With something, not quite rubbish?

They did it decently,

Washed the cold face with colder drops of pity,

Baptised it for luck,

And put it in the earth where it belonged.

I never saw the features I had made,

The hands I had felt groping

For the life I tried to give, and could not.

But still, I sometimes dream I hear it crying

Lost somewhere and unfed,

Shut in a cupboard, or lying in the snow,

And I search the night, and call, as though to rescue

Part of myself, from the grave of things undone.