Poem for My (Non-Existent) Adult Child
By Subhaga Crystal Bacon
You were not conceived, despite the spent seed, the rich bed of blood. You did not laden my life with bittersweet fruit: memorable sayings, illness, brilliance, a body made of mine, either like or unlike. Your gender is neutral, or, it is your own, your selfness. You love who and what you love with fire and ice. You are a pearl of the world, gem of grit and spit, that gives you a shell and a tongue both salty and sweet. We speak once a day, week, month, year, decade. I did you right and wrong from my own pocket of wounds and stars. Fleet as the scent of mock orange on the wind, you are a blossom of loss, phantom limb.
Subhaga Crystal Bacon (she/they) is a Queer poet living in rural northcentral Washington on unceded Methow land. She is the author of four collections of poetry, including Surrender of Water in Hidden Places, winner of the Red Flag Poetry Chapbook Prize (April 2023) and Transitory, recipient of the Isabella Gardner Award for Poetry (November 2023, BOA Editions).
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oh,Crystal, beautiful sonnet. I can so relate. Sue Oringel
"Fleet as the scent of mock orange on the wind,
you are a blossom of loss, phantom limb."
This is evokes so many of my senses while being so clever, placing a beautiful word like blossom next to loss, and describing non-existent being as a phantom limb. I never would have thought to think about phantom limb in such a context. You've given quite a few notes for how I'll write about loss in future works. Very good.