In the Event of Conception by Ashley Roach-Freiman

If it were to happen? If I were egg-round, and no going back —

would you catch a new sun through a feather crown?

Cradle split with blood. Think: estuary. Soft, liquid warble.

Her tongue would grow long with eating,

her mouth an open orchid. Pink worm

manifesting songs you learned with your father:

I am homeless, come and take me,

into the the reach of your rattling drums,

let me know, babe, all about my fortune,

all along my restless palms. What would we call her?

Sticky tendrilous hair moonlight and bone,

blue branches along the softness of her skull.

She might not be a pretty baby. It won’t matter.

Beauty is water singing tongue-songs,

or the green tips in the nested trees.

See the future? You could hold her,

reach inside the rupture, and peel back bark.

* The passage in italics is excerpted from Bob Dylan’s “Spanish Harlem Incident.”

Ashley Roach-Freiman is a librarian and poet with work appearing in Bone Bouquet, Tinderbox Poetry Journal, THRUSH Poetry Journal, Smartish Pace, The Literary Review, and Superstition Review. She coordinates and hosts the Impossible Language reading series in Memphis, TN. More about her can be found at ashleyroachfreiman.com.