My birth plan is the sequel

to a movie I lie and say 

I have seen.  I catch

the trailer on an evening

walk, people watch

television near open curtains,          

their mouths filled 

with the blue of the screen. 

A man clears a mess he didn’t make

from a table. 

I am curious about how 

the neighbors arrange their

furniture.  I am curious

about how agony will 

humiliate my body. 

I have a belly 

full of organs

that have never been 

displaced. 

I have kept myself

so whole. The blonde hair 

in my comb is not mine. 

The child that crawls

into my bed

is.