If I were emptied out, the contents of my stomach examined, what would the surgeon find? There might be metallic bits, tacks, nails, a lace hanky or two, a length of twine, as there was in this ostrich’s stomach when the London Zoo had it autopsied. Cause of death? The four-inch nail it swallowed. What emptiness was it trying to fill? Perhaps the obvious longing for open ground where it could stretch its lengthy legs. Or maybe it mourned the grown-cold egg, the hatchling that refused to arrive.
In my stomach perhaps a pacifier, a rattle, a swaddling blanket to soothe the transition, a womb-wrap’s echo. Last night I dreamed again of an infant in arms, my arms, its small head propped up on my shoulder, its bottom rounding up and out like snail shell. Yes, there would be neonate paraphernalia in my stomach, baby things, not enough to hinder normal digestion, but enough to render me uncomfortable, on the margins of unsettled, searching for the coinage to quiet the groaning, the staple or button to clinch this gaping.
Dayna Patterson is founding editor-in-chief of Psaltery & Lyre, poetry editor for Exponent II Magazine, and a consulting editor of Bellingham Review. Her creative work has appeared or is forthcoming in AGNI, Hotel Amerika, Sugar House Review, Western Humanities Review, Zone 3, and others.