First Voice

‘You’re my beautiful wife,’ you say, as you drive into me again and again.

I close my eyes.

‘It’s so much better for you now,’ you say. No question.

And of course it is, no battle pain. But you don’t understand that I’ve lost.

‘And my son, and his sons, Can you imagine?’

I don’t ask, What if it’s a girl?

The surgeon smiles at his work, my husband beams, expectant.

I fear my growing belly.

They say, ‘You’ll be fine,’ but they won’t tell me the sex.

And in the ninth month, je suis l’appel du vide.

Second Voice

‘You’re still beautiful,’ you say.

I raise my eyebrows, note that you won’t touch the scars, (But nor will I).

‘We still can, I mean, you could just bottlefeed,’ he says.

We discuss it with the counsellor.

Adopt. Donated eggs.

Just get a fucking doll, I scream, then it won’t cry, either.

‘I thought, now it’s all over, why isn’t it better now? You don’t seem happy.’

I stand. I walk away.

 ‘I stood by you, All through, until … we fell apart. You don’t want me.’

You’re wrong, I say, I don’t want me.

It doesn’t end.

I thought it would, job done, a perfect 36C.

But you didn’t anticipate another cancer within me.