Lorrie Ness
How to Carry the Same Child Twice
The jar tips.
Grey ash swirls into winter sky—
I hold my breath.
His carbon record spins on the breeze.
Pine needles search for grooves
to play his echo. But there is only moan,
mournful exhale—
Wind across the lips of this jar,
deep and hollow.
This primal lullaby
leaves my chest as empty as the vessel I hold,
leaves my lungs a hungry chasm.
I am a feral woman
desperate for fullness pack the void—
my empty breast.
Gasping and gulping within the blowback,
till I am gravid with his dust.
Gestating in the safety of my chest,
while he corrodes me like miner’s lung—
grey on pink. Forever
blotting with my handkerchief when I cough.
Checking it for spots—
red on cotton.
Lorrie Ness is an emerging poet. She draws inspiration for her writing through time outdoors. Writing is her means of refuge and connection. She has forthcoming publications at Barren Magazine, FRiGG, Sky Island Journal, SOFTBLOW, the American Journal of Poetry, Rosebud, The Maryland Literary Review and the Big Windows Review.
Return to November 2019 Edition
The jar tips.
Grey ash swirls into winter sky—
I hold my breath.
His carbon record spins on the breeze.
Pine needles search for grooves
to play his echo. But there is only moan,
mournful exhale—
Wind across the lips of this jar,
deep and hollow.
This primal lullaby
leaves my chest as empty as the vessel I hold,
leaves my lungs a hungry chasm.
I am a feral woman
desperate for fullness pack the void—
my empty breast.
Gasping and gulping within the blowback,
till I am gravid with his dust.
Gestating in the safety of my chest,
while he corrodes me like miner’s lung—
grey on pink. Forever
blotting with my handkerchief when I cough.
Checking it for spots—
red on cotton.
Lorrie Ness is an emerging poet. She draws inspiration for her writing through time outdoors. Writing is her means of refuge and connection. She has forthcoming publications at Barren Magazine, FRiGG, Sky Island Journal, SOFTBLOW, the American Journal of Poetry, Rosebud, The Maryland Literary Review and the Big Windows Review.
Return to November 2019 Edition