CONSIDERING OTHERHOOD

Conception is a concept which manifests
into a physiological form; 
an individual body becomes a host, 
an interruption in oneness.
 
The host’s feet might weigh heavily
on the ground, standing guard
against the possibility of erosion.

Good Boundaries
are a false foothold,
sending the carrying body
into otherhood.

Everything that matters dangles
around live tissue.

Otherhood is iffy and malleable;
it is an instinct, a social agreement,
a lineage, a gendered expectation.

The tiny cluster of cells become tissue.
Strings of chromosomes and amino acids
jump start a hormonal flood.
 
This thing inside,
this little piece of the universe,
composing itself in the forging fluid,
writing itself from microscopic lines of code,
foaming up like live yeast,
linking molecules, acids, proteins, and glucose.
 
The materials of being slowly become a self.

Live birth is a meticulous game of chance.
The anticipation carries an aura of superstition-
How everything in the universe
smelts from one continuous membrane,
rooted from the body,
dividing itself out into otherhood.