caverns

By Katherine Perry

i scoop seeds of a cantaloupe
with a soup spoon, dropping each
ball into the sink until the orange
mass covers the drain.
switching on the disposal, i
watch the potential plants
being sucked away into a sewer
system where no soil will ever
nurture them. The expectant
house looms over me like
carlsbad
where an eight-year-old me watched
the growing mud bulge and balloon
under years of single drops
of earth and stone, blood and bone
of our planet. to spice up the browns
and whites for kids like me, the
national park system set up spotlights
of reds, blues, purples, and golds
to make the stalagmites and stalactites
pulse.
i fill my flat belly, a testament to hours
of pilates and yoga, with fruit: no
stretch marks, no sagging breasts. inside,
no cell has ever grown, no replication, not
even a mistake that i could scrape away
like the scores of the women i have known,
crying, conflicted, contrite
as the doctor swept away the mishaps
of youth, the fertilization that came too early.
upstairsbedrooms without beds wait for me
to make decisions, ask me how many more
years i will watch the droplets form
and then wipe them away. an echo
repeats the question, bounces between
the flat walls and the angular wedge cuts.
nothing swells, nothing grows, even the echoes
flatten.


Previously published in Southern Women's Review, Vol 2, Issue 2