Pregnant

I am pregnant and I am not embarassed,
and I refuse to defend myself before the disappointed.
My babies have not been fathered by the patriarchy, but they are not bastards.
I am not busy in commerce-- I am not a landlord or collector or provider, but they will never be abandoned.
I am going to live in a forest where moss bathes my toes and makes slippers for trees and pillows of stones;
I am going to deny concrete and its fumes; I am going to swim every swell of my heart; for it is good for my babies.
I am going to learn not to worry. I am going to learn to listen to my fingers and dismember every gate which does not allow the seeds of wind and rain and light.
I am so pregnant I cannot see my feet, but my path leads me.
When a poem comes through me, I embrace its vortex and adore its apparitions and whisper every word of its appendages into song.
And when voices will no longer echo from the bones of my back, sleep will make me a baby in a belly again.

- Richard Fammeree