thumper

nine months delayed. in seven more, hopefully the small one who beats so lively will emerge, perfect and so long wanted. for now, ten weeks in, i can only hope that the nausea and unexpected retching will soon pass. and double-check, occasionally, for the thumping.

she surprised us with two babies last night, immaculately formed and already mobile. he said she chirped and shrieked and he didn't know what was going on. by the time i arrived and noted the new movement in their space, he still hadn't bothered to check the source of her distress. hopefully, this oblivion will not extend to me.

in athens, he is a changed man. this trip has done him much good, and i am infinitely relieved that he has taken it, that he takes the time to indicate the wonder he's experienced, to jot down the marvels of his new exposure.

papping them, i find myself often startled by the work that goes into the grooming and i wonder if it matters, i wonder if they notice, if they prefer the pedophilic look, bare, easily chafed. i wonder if they care or if, as with her tits, it's something the ladies bother themselves about, probably because of porn and fear, and the men, once dark and damp, couldn't be bothered with.

my mind is overtaken by placenta. it's a struggle to concentrate, respond briefly, even, to e-mail. i am hoping this, too, will pass and i will begin again to see clearly. next time, anchorage.

thump, thump. keep it up, my dear, and keep your mommy sane.

sorta fairytale

so it goes, one experience blending numbly into another, crisis marked by crisis; joyousness marked by tardiness, mishap, glowering grooms with beaming brides who forgot that they were 1.5 hours late as soon as they slipped on their fairytale shoes. the latter 1/2 of 2006 filled with familial tension and ob experiences both professional and personal that tore my heart strings, made me need to write, but left me oozing, drained, with neither time nor capacity.

so many sad births to so many beautiful babies. alive and dead. and he preparing to take his own journey off what he calls the mudball, claiming the experience as exclusively his own, forcing everyone out in his furious denial. i feel pretty like a four..................

so here i plunge from bagging babies and biting my tongue not to scream at each of them to make it hers, hers, hers, not theirs because birthing babies is not about provider convenience and while they've handled cases 14 times today, it is the first birth she's attended today to critical care and cardiac arrest, learning to code with the best of them so that my fingertips know as my heart does what to do in crisis.

and she sits across from me, inching closer to me as her girlfriend traipses her hollywood tan and chanel lips around the house, parading the baby we all know she can't stand around the room, ice-blue eyes boring into me, telling me if i need her, she's there; she understands the loss. 5 times for her, but she's so much older than me. and it's three deaths, one wrenching 1/2 life for me. she sits across from me wishing that she'd found me to talk codes and med mal before she found her to ogle.

and she perches on the other side of the room, eyeing me uneasily, telepathically transmitting messages to not let on that i know what he doesn't know, may never know, could not possibly want to know except that it would definitively end his marriage, and today might be better than next year. if it weren't for the money.

so, resolution 2007: writing, exploring, screening out, exposing. getting myself back on track. first things first, gotta nail this exam. breathe, breathe, push.

gift of life

this morning:

she's just failed at the second of two attempts in ten months, not as monumentally this time, but still an aching failure, which leaves her with a body not a temple, but a dungeon, in which she's trapped and constantly staring down shrinking breasts, billowing pimples, barren womb. she has failed in her biological duty to protect the species' most helpless, which leaves her helpless, hopeless, useless; still, without direct and bloody evidence, she struggles to hold out hope for herself, for them, for all the unrequited loves she feels she's losing, having only barely touched. she's not sure if she wants it to pour from her or not; what would it mean if it didn't? she reaches for him at night, needing to hold him, touch him, feel useful, wanted, needed, full, and he pushes her hands away, sighing, suddenly snoring. she reaches for him in the morning, and he rolls his eyes, annoyed by the depth of her need; she tells him, "i'm sad," trying to convey the enormity of her loss in socially acceptable, transparent means, only to have him respond, "i know," and leave. and she lies, tangled in sheets hardly sullied, contemtuously mournful because, although it's not the same, last time breathes frighteningly in her ear. she fights an uphill battle during the day, the bottom looming terrifyingly upward at her, knowing her father inches closer to death each day and not knowing if she wants him dead or alive just long enough to know she's sorry, just long enough to understand that all those years, all those times, it wasn't really what she meant. and it all oozes slowly from her just like he seeps from between the sheets, out the back door, trickling down the steps, away, leaving her holding out hope for the next time they're together, and she finds herself dismayed when he starts snoring, aching emptily not just because her need is unfulfilled, but also because he makes her beg--the synergy she felt in maine disappointingly diminished, her bodily pain exacerbated by his lust for all things busty, feminine, airbrushed into perfection. and she lies next to him, sobbing in time to his snores, imperfectly outlined, unfemininely empty. but still she feels oddly full, having not yet truly shed the remnants of this year's death. she looks up at the sky as he trots cheerfully beside her, watches it graying, moving, and hopes for torrential rain that will allow her to cry without him noticing, sighing, rolling his eyes, burdened by the hurricane of her pain.

then, this afternoon:

she reaches over, not really knowing what to say, takes a handful of my wet, rusty hair, proclaims its beauty and asks if i'm not going to give it away. i want to slap her, watch her eyes uncrinkle in shock, maybe a thin line of blood dribble from her nostril. i want to grab her, shake her. i want to pierce her as she has me. have i not given enough? does he not sit giggling shyly, his shock of blonde hair waving in the wind, behind me? am i not empty enough? i understand his mumbojumbo speech and seemingly confused gestures better than she does, and i think, one body, one blood, one understanding, but know that, really, it has nothing to do with who bore him and when and more to do with who she is inside and what she often assumes she knows, how she bowls the world over. bowls me over, brushes me off, shuts me down. and they're both the same: bow down, bitch, and ask permission to microwave your fajita. the weeds drove her crazy, but stepping on the tomato was the last straw, just as i drive her crazy and the snapping of the sprinkler head was the last straw.

marking me

following 3 hours spent baldly eyeing me across, through, over them, he finds me later in isolation, engrossed but accessible and, depositing his effects at the altar of my feet, settles himself to my right to tell me that he loves my muscles, appreciate my strength, you are so brave, so bold. so strong, sexy, smart.

flattered at first, i acknowledge the occupation of his ring finger and absorb his lamentation on love and the disillusionment it provokes.

in the same way, he once admired my strength, i'm sure this one admired things about his beloved that he now finds intolerably unstable, that he now stores as fuel for his husbandly rants. honey, if i were yours eternally, you wouldnt' like my muscles and you'd soon abhor my strength. you'd think i was controlling and you'd find my boldness cruel.

then, watching another across, through, over me, you'd discover true appeal in attributes that were not mine. and you'd love them. until you owned them.

falafel truck

hey, baby, hey, baby, hey, baby.

he leans, leering, oveer the wares on his cart, forcing himself into my line of vision, eyes perusing my every angle, glinting hungrily above his suggestive smirk.

fuck you, sir, for raping me on the street. fuck you, sir, for dicomfiting me in my own skin, thrusting your mind into my pants, your xray eyes through my shirt. fuck you, sir, for your needy, virtual hands.



besides the sidewalk sexualization, i am distressed because i know this lurks also in him, that what the turbaned one articulated would never escape from his mouth, but would hover instead subversively just below his lips, tongue, teeth and penetrate every one of them through his quai-transcendent, denying gaze.

best in show

"i guess it was for the best. he said it was. i can't be too mad or sad or whatever about it, you know. i'm just glad nothing bad happened. can you imagine? i mean, what if i hadn't been here? this baby. this miracle. this child. he could have died. so i'm sad and stuff that i didn't do it the way i wanted, but, mostly, i'm just grateful. it wasn't what i wanted, but i think it saved that baby's life." her fingers graze her stapled stomach and she grimaces in pain. "also, it's good this way because i didn't have to go through all that. i've heard it really hurts."

"i'm not sure i could have done it. my moms said that baby'd bust my butt in two. then, the doctor said he'd grown too big so fast when he did the ultrasound. he was too big for me to push his ass out. i wasn't wanting to try. i couldn't do that shit. seven pounds is a lot of baby."

"you know, i feel it's very empowering, being able to come in now, not disrupting my life, schedule things when i want them, so i can rearrange my work, get someone to cover for me, get some things in order, not have to rush out, half-naked, in the middle of the night, bleeding in a taxi cab, who knows when the baby would have come? now that i'm here, there'll be no surprises. they'll just cut me open and take her right out. i just hope they sedate me well, but i do, really, thank god that i live in a country that values my voice, that gives me this power."

"my husband was worried, a little, about, you know, down there, and then i've talked to my friends who've had babies, you know, naturally, and they've said things about, you know, stretching down there, and then, well, you hear people talking, you know, and i think not for all that. i carried this baby 9 whole months and now my body's shot to hell, you know? not that, too. it's all i've got left. so, i talked to my doctor, and we're going to just bypass the whole thing, you know? just zip and it's out and i don't even have to worry about what things will feel like at the end, whether it'll, you know, stay snug down there. he said with the surgery, while i'm under, they my be able to tighten up my belly a bit, too, which, really, i mean, look at me."

room 4

his body, bent and broken, lies uselessly strapped and tubed, heaing violently with each mechanical breath. blood crusts his ears, neck, nose, eyes, brownly dried and surrounding each potential exit. under the bleached bandage turban, his closed eyes mesmerize, a remarbly circular idnigo against his ashen face. i feel dirty and force my gaze away, but find my eyse drawn repeatedly to the shadow of his.

i wonder briefly if they're blue.

he beat the kid's mom, so the son beat him within an inch of his own life. i imagine the cracking impact of the aluminum bat against his broken nose, shattered skull, and i recall the american history x scene that still makes me shudder, despite having seen it a hundred different times. still, the same violent crack, bite the curb, nigger, the same nauseating, spurting, shattering impact makes me look away.

the policeman stands guard all day at his bedside, as if he poses a serious risk of flight, as if, if he so desired, he could arise and run away. his leg twitches involuntarily and alarms sound around his bed. his intracranial pressure spikes and his body heaves, his falccid head thrust fitfully agains the hard plastic of his life machine.

if and when he wakes, he will be escorted to county jail, and court, and supposed justic will be served. the staff keep him alive now so he can be cuffed later, although he may not remember her name, much less that he beat her or how. but he's a mean, mean bastard and, by god, we've nabbed him. we've got him right where we want him: strapped to a bed and heaving like hell, and praise the Lord, he'll get what he deserves.

running down the middle of me most of the time

stilettos steeped in puddle, hair, dripping, stuck in streaks across my face, tears, running, mating frenetically with the rain, tire folded on itself, car leaning into the beating sheets of rain while i stomp and shout: my early morning tantrum.

and he could care less, hubristically waxing in the back of her car, relishing his alpha maleness, making space in his repository for new images--later masturbatory fodder, since it's never enough, since fucking nightly doesn't solve it--he's still mounting me in his sleep, pressing firmly, forcefully into me as he dreams about something, someone i've never seen, he's never touched. it's not enough, enough, enough. he could care less.

selfishly, he's hanging up, ignoring. and she's calling me four, five, six times to check to make sure i'm ok, so maybe i need a female after all.

and i said, baby, it's a problem that these dirty, dumb mechanics offer more support than my damn husband. and, silent, he then said, well, what is there to do. they, at least, can rotate my tires. they, at least, know what they've been missing. they, at least, anticipated the storm and braced me against it, offering towels, coffee, discounted reassurance.

and he could care less. stop bitching if you don't know what you want me to do.

i know i need more than this, more than you. i know i need somebody who isn't constantly distracted by every xx who passes by. i know i need someone whose emotion can effuse close to mine. he can't be a mindreader, but i can't spell out the obvious all the time. time to stop identifying. time to do.

baby, i love you; that's why i'm leaving. i can't hover in constant competition with your more immediate needs.

harder to be friends than lovers

i love him.
i do not like him.
i wrote out of great distress and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to grieve him but to let him know the depth of my love for him.

last night's lie and its discovery penetrated me to the core. we are on all the wrong pages. he is sabotaging. i am shutting down.

analyzing him until 2 in the morning, intermittently in bouts of tearful awakening throughout the night, again this morning when i found him where he'd retreated on the futon near the port of his addiction and i couldn't help touching his sleeping face, again this morning with his arms around me, arousing in me what hasn't been in months, passionately plying me, pleading with me: don't go--stay for this--this, this, at least, can be so good. kicking myself all the way from the station, and her words echoing: you looked so happy, so lucky.

but my finger is bare. and it won't be adorned until this shit gets resolved. he might have to leave for it to happen. but he won't. because he knows if he accepts the offer, the door will remain closed, and i will not invite his return. so happy. so lucky.

too late for annulment. so lucky.

analyze this: me: so happy, so angry, so eager to be finished, out. as much as i read the koran with him yesterday and used the tool of his own clanging obsession to straighten out his thoughts, to instill images he'd previously ignored, i cannot apply it to myself, perhaps because i cannot chant the ayahs as they deserve--perhaps because the energy he felt with his mis-diagnosed hands hovering over my back, telling me my hair should be covered, we should not be so close, second wife, second wife, was not the energy i needed to connect the words to my soul, properly internalize. you are not a dictator over them. you are a reminder.

so, the e-mail: my reminder. but, still, my ultimatum. how do you balance tyranny? at what point does one become not just the reminder, not just the self-advocate she could never be but a shatan of a controlling, fiery-eyed, suspicious bitch? and how much does it matter that his very activity incites this reaction? i am still responsible. i am still cognitively capable (if not otherwise) of controlling my emotional katrina.

he is selfish. i am selfish. i am wanting, wanting, wanting, tired of giving. but this is an evaluation of myself. his taking: immaterial. i am selfishly wanting him to be a better man, to intuit, to know, to seek to understand me; i am selfishly wanting him to invest emotionally in me, to open himself to me, to explore his motivations and inclinations with me, to connect, interlace, weld. i am selfishly wanting more of him. but i am also selfishly wanting more of me. back.

i am wanting to control. i am tired of the powerlessness of this place. fatigued by my failures, i am forcing myself harder, louder, considering the big D if i can't get control. but i can't control. i can't change the things i want to change. i can't even touch them. o, god, grant me some fucking serenity to accept the things i cannot change. i cannot change him.

i am emotionally withdrawn. my arms ache from the constant shit-shoveling to get back to the spark he asked me about after the exam today. i told him i couldn't find it. and that i was starting not to care. it was too much work to keep the bellows pumping. by myself. i have let go of the reins, but not wholly yet. i sobbed into the flattened pillow (not my princesa poufs) in the grey hours wishing there were hope, feeling a failure for having shoved him away. i still want to connect. so badly.

i am insensitive to how he is feeling. i am curt, sarcastic, snide and unwilling to hear anything he has to say--i am too involved in my own indignation about marrying a 14 year-old to understand his perspective. he called me on this. and i shoved him away. i beg empathy, but i don't provide it in return.

i am unrealistic in my expectations of him. i want him to read my mind. i want him to be less of a man, more of a curvaceous, sensual woman who will envelop me in her soft flesh, emanate understanding from her miniscule but multitudinous pores. i want him to understand and effuse, despite the fact that i know he cannot realistically do either.

i am apparently failing to meet his needs, but he does not share such matters with me, preferring instead to hide his routes to self-service from me.

i am sarcastic. o, i am sarcastic. i am cutting. i am abrupt. i am cruel. i have very little patience for his personal explanations.

i jump to conclusions incredibly rapidly, not letting him finish, assigning his motives, emotions, and refusing to hear his own self-analysis, dismissing it as disingenuous rationalization, the product of an immature man out of touch with himself.

i am becoming inflexible. i am expecting him to conform to my ideals. i am trying to force things, feeling so long overlooked, so seriously trampled.

i am rude: i want to punch your fucking face. he's right. i wouldn't stand for it from him.

i am nagging. she detected this cycle. i am also unheard. so i scream. again and again and again, further infuriated with each incantation.

i need to develop an unconditional commitment to him. i am not there. i am preparing for him to move out. i am hoping, in many ways, he will. my own port: my own escape. if he leaves, i mustn't struggle through this shit. if he leaves, in some ways, i have triumphed.

why did we fuck this morning? why like that? suddenly. we were both so hateful. and then more passionate and loving than we have been in weeks. and all i wanted was a kiss. a reminder. but that...

i need to cultivate my humility. he is aggravatingly imperfect, but i am not a diety myself. i have failings, massive ones, and there are things that are intolerable about me. i need to step outside myself and objectively inventory my shit. you're the reason for the word bitch, bitch.

and, now, for her wisdom. we can manage the lovers. maybe she can direct back to a time when we were friends. or maybe it's better to make lovers of extant friends.

mommy dearest

motherless me, compensatorily caring. i have mamaed my entire life, providing maternity and love for everyone who lacks it, from them just years my juniors to he whose mother threw him to the wolves to her whose body i produced to he whose mother couldn't put down the pipe long enough to help him walk, later watch him, in cap and gown, walk, to he whose laundry i now dutifully fold.
and i mothered him, who was ostensibly my parent. and her, because she couldn't do the same for me.
and him, who i handed over to his rightful mother.

he described my personality perfectly this morning, and i sat wondering if it pricked their ears as it did mine, knowing they'd be diagnosing themselves behind me, each of us pathological in our own right.

she exclaimed to me this morning that i must be the world's best mother. and all i can do is laugh. my own would have me thrown in jail for my lacking maternal behavior.

but she of all people sent me a card on mother's day, telling me that she thought i was a fabulous mother; for all her disdain of what i represent, for all her sorrow at her son's having selected me over the harvard-educated neurotic, she stills wishes she had done some of what i'd do.

still, mass-sitting skills aside, there is so much for her to disapprove. and so much for him to dismiss.

i wonder what fatherlessness did to him.

and how the two of them mesh, having complementary losses.