No child will have our poor vision,
no girl–rawboned and gaptoothed,
no boy–truck-addled and bow-legged.
Is our love less than, not holy,
selfish or selfless? It takes more
than love to keep love alive,
couples splitting all around us
with a nasty thud, clatter
of lawyers’ billable hours.
The couples ferry children
back and forth like cargo,
but we never boarded ship,
never wanted those dangerous
waters, marital cowards.
No couple should have kids
to prove they’re a couple,
hurling their DNA into the gene
pool just because. What sense
does it make to blame us
for what we didn’t want to hold,
scorn us for a lack
of progeny when you can’t
tell love when you see it:
everyone greeting us
as strangers at
every hotel check-in,
servers always asking
if our check should be split.
Photo by Anna Laura Irsara
