Plump as bruised fruit, their legs
straddle too-small chairs, abiding
the weight of their nine-month
inevitables. Nature no gentler

a mother since the uncle apes
first began to sing and stand.
Childless―it is not permitted to
these crooked bones―I cannot

pity or envy them. Yet who
would say I haven’t dreamt of
Little (or an Else) in a lover’s
face, in my own thinned hands.