NURTURING, BY Anna Sandy-Elrod |
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When I begin considering pregnancy, I dream, three nights in a row, of the boy I loved in my teenage years. Each morning, I wake thinking of his hands—hard on the steering wheel as he swerved toward a small, darting squirrel, flattened it beneath his heavy tires and smirked. I was raised to desire a little cruelty, and I’m sorry for my want of it. I dug my nails into the undersides of my hands and stared, silent, at the tiny death in the road behind us. How he would crush a thing just to prove he could. I dream of him, the way my hands reached and withdrew. My husband sleeps beside me and knows nothing of how I used to thrill at being hurt. I tell myself I deserve, now, to make something innocent and fragile. I tell myself all my waking hours. |
Anna Sandy-Elrod is a PhD poet and Editor of Birdcoat Quarterly, as well as Ghost Peach Press. Her work can be found in places like the North American Review, Threepenny Review, Green Mountains Review, Fugue, Calyx, and others. She lives in Atlanta with her husband, three cats, and one tiny dog.