I Took Poetry I My Freshman Year

When my mother was arrested, I experimented

with prose to unscramble my losses.

Three years of suckling on the same bone—

bitter-sweet marrow spills from my cracks.

The base of my throat is clogged with swallowed

cries for clarity. The ache burns my tongue when

I read my poetry. My mother is sent to prison in

September. I take a notebook to the trial and bleed

on the page. Black ink stains my journals—

and my fingers. The color of my lungs.

I’m given the prompt “write about a dream”

on a mid-October afternoon in Poetry II.

I feel the burn of the McDonalds fries

in my esophagus. I let my head sink.

Embarrassed I can’t recall a single one,

I write about something that feels surreal.

Over eighty percent of female inmates

are mothers. The prison walls excrete steam,

like embers—the concrete building sweats

out the tears of loved ones lost.

Across the US, thousands of women die

and are reborn every day. Each morning,

Unshackled from the iron, they spread their

wings and crumble to ash. Another day on fire

my mother once said. Only seven percent of

inmates are female—coals stomped out by isolation.

Less than one percent will never hold their children

again. Deemed by strangers “too violent”

to hold their flesh and blood, so I let it pool out

from my veins. Some wrists feel human connection

more than some mothers ever will again—

Like my mother never will again.