‘Expecting’
by Emily Freeman

I have cradled architecture, nursed dreamy-milk  

kitchen sinks and hushed a mint Roberts radio  

in hanging visions. 

 

In a moment, my egg, my possible fate,  

I saw you grown. I could choose an apple 

from the bowl, run water, 

 

knead dough, but I feel no need to cradle,  

nurse or hush – it just isn’t in me.  

 

I have had to kill you, kitchen dear, smother you in   

your cot because you are not what I want. I am not  

your mother, and you are no child of mine;  

 

I held you in magazines to try you on for size, 

and you cried. I wanted you so badly that I married  

men and their newspapers,  

 

men I thought you’d like to lean against your  

marble worktops, in a daze whilst I baked bread, 

made cake batter in duck-egg mixers 

 

to too sweet dreams - now thrown up.  

I cannot force-feed for comfort, have to 

leave your shining surfaces  

 

like unwiped tear-smeared cheeks, 

and swap pastel clean for some kind  

of chaos.