Birth, revised

My next birth will be a different kind of
tight, calcified into crust. I’ll shape it: new

tunnels in my body. A thickening
Wrapped in neurotic web.

Current,

You’ll ripple through canals.
in mucous that dries. Flakes

Stone smooth in my waiting hands
like breath. Your facade

When do cracks appear? Days
of this kind of external gestation

in open air. Part-time incubation
of bodies or radiating leaves.

your arrival: a clean break.
Slit. Split in approximate halves.

I expect you to unfurl. Shudder.
this body without you living

ovular. Avian. Reptilian. Packed
and blank-boned inside the dark

seed. Leathered soft, faintly muscular.
A network of impulse.

electric.

Involuntary, small. A message
into soft curls of ash. Delivered.

or pulsing on sand. A quiver
in sheen, reflective. A mirror.

or weeks. I don’t know much
but I’ll make you a womb

in shared heat
There will be the moment of

Membrane tearing in brief. Puncture.
A geometric emergence.

Expand with life. Must I still temple
inside these walls?

Stefanie Kirby is a bilingual poet residing along Colorado’s front range. She studied poetry at Lighthouse Writers Workshop, and her work appears or is forthcoming in Rust+Moth, Plumwood Mountain, Ethel Zine, and elsewhere.