Jordie Albiston

embryo

when I was first thought of I can feel deep
in my cells as yet unmade    & then when I'm
made the maths murder through my sleepy
so-slowly growing    till I split-split into my
very own self & I know the end! that begins
the every world    but then when the sum at
last finally becomes she knew all the nothing
there just never was    & cries like a bub that

cried & cried ever more & more for a mother
to come & do all the doings a baby can't do
for herself    now I am old & I try not to stare
but the tv is winning & I'm scared I'm scared
that maybe I'm dead & it was never me who
gets to be born not me but somebody    other