CONFIRMATION DAY
In my 59th year on earth
The test she took turned pink,
But I couldn't believe the best lets
Devised had failed and I would be a dad again.
"Accept our child," she said.
"I will try," I said.
I could doubt it.
Ignore the muscle thickening and rising,
The pre-maternal fleshing out,
Her rubbery movements of the joints.
"About the size of an orange now"
The Doctress said with a dadward glance.
I kept my distance and my doubts,
Three months numb, fanning an ember of doubt.
She slicked the belly to listen,
Lubed the skin to hear a hearbeat above
The amplified gurgles and frictions.
There it was, the confirmation,
A choo-choo chugging sound,
An overworked engine climbing a grade,
Like those I heard in my bed as a boy,
The mile-off night trains bound for Buffalo or Erie,
Unseen and always receding from me,
Moaning their loneliness in the dark,
Doppling an occasional sad wail our separation.
Then it is to be.
There will be another child.
And no Einstein to reverse time for our trains.