End of the Bleeding

Who knew I'd feel this desperate
To hold on to the bleeding?

To realize I can trade in maxi for mini,
And I insist on the industrial-size.

A few more drops of liquid life,
And you're gone, little one,
Gone,
Along with all that housed you.

My uterus is an empty rented house,
Scrubbed clean,
Waiting for the next inhabitant.

Death of the Firstborn

This Birth was hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death. — T.S. Eliot

They all look quite like you at that age,
      and dead like nothing at all,
      a clot of purple-gray, sticky and wrapped with strong, black ribbons.

Feeling you leave in a gush of pain and red,
      in the blackest and loneliest part of the night,
was a hard & bitter agony,
      like giving birth,
giving birth to death.

Why were we led all that way, and never to see your face?
How could I do this again?
Death of the firstborn,
      and God spares no one,
      because why should we be passed over?