Being pregnant was a paradise – a peninsula
But the afterbirth was an island.
The germination, the cultivation, pronounced by celebrations,
Declarations and exclamations and explanations of advice unsolicited
But faithfully submitted by those committed to the high stakes of my uterus.

You’re either for us or against us.
Nothing was simple or absolute during those 39 weeks,
Save for the fact that no one is ever a little pregnant.
A woman either is or she isn’t.

Those 273 days
Made me sleepy-humble-hungry-gluttonous-meek.
It made me silent though I mouthed words to speak.
It made me find solace and solitude of stacked pillows and sheets.
It made me walk-wander-waddle for some reprieve, a retreat.

Smiley faces. Personally escorted places.
Given the graces every virtuous woman deserves.
But our society has the gall, the nerve,
To place only the expectant woman on such reserve.

Belly bumps and tummy touches,
Barren women with misplaced crutches,
A workplace that lawlessly holds grudges,
Because now our loyalties are divided.
Secretly chided, socially derided,
The phone stops ringing,
Fake smiles can’t hide it.

There’s no denying it.
Something has changed.
Forever buried and frozen in time like a fossil stamped in lava
That cannot be carbon dated.

Glossy advertisements,
Catalog copy from maternity lines,
Paint a rosy glow of stretch marks and saggy tits sublime,
But the silence to which the marketplace submits
Is such a gutless, ruthless crime.

Pregnant. Women. Are. Not. Always. Happy.
New. Mothers. Sometimes. Question. What. In. The. Hell. They’ve. Done.
Sometimes they want to run.
Leave on a jet plane to nowhere …
(Covertly coveting a crash).

Pregnancy was a peninsula.
Connected at the hip to the outside world,
Yet somehow biopsied away from the nucleus, the breath, the life beat, the pulse.
Becoming otherness.

The afterbirth was an island.
Cast out like a quarantine.
Imprisoned in isolation.

Now facing the chasm, the schism, the divide …
Trying to swim through the gulf,
Create a bridge between the Haves and Have-Nots –
Those with and without progeny.

My concerns have been catapulted to the cornice of conscientiousness.
Their dates without fate,
One-night stands
And perils of having too much discretionary income
No longer raise a brow
Or throw my voice by an octave.

I mull over …
The Juggled Life.
The Second Shift.
The Mask of Motherhood.
Or my state of Flux.

They don’t really give fuck.

The afterbirth was an island.
The phone stopped ringing …
The visits ceased …
A dark circle under an eye evolved into a permanent crease …
Because the tears still haven’t been released …

Two years later
And this woman is still searching
for a semblance of postpartum support and peace.
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K. Danielle Edwards is author of Stacey Jones: Memoirs of Girl & Woman, Body & Spirit, Life & Death. The Nashville-based poet and writer is a wife and doting mother to her toddler daughter. She is working on a master’s degree in the humanities, with an emphasis in literature, and earns her keep as a public relations and communications professional. For more, visit www.kdanielleedwards.com.