Grace

Grieving for herself and her baby killed

Dead child of a child lays her head

The flesh she carried on the table dead

The empty uterus, the blood she spilled

A womb now colder than the tile floor.

It won’t be long before her sixteenth year

Only the boy knows, no one else is here.

The nuns have seen this many times before

But now it is too late to change her mind.

She might have had his eyes, her shade of hair

The nurses recognize that vacant stare.

Rocking herself, the gown opened behind.

She closed the eyes her fingers will not trace

What had she done? The voices will not rest

On the table, damning her swollen breast.

If she could name her she would call her Grace.