Rachel

The day was late, the sky was that
Barren and oppressive grey
You see in soulless English towns
The colour on the station’s front
Already muted by the sheer
Disinterest of those around.
And I was there, not quite a child,
But not quite yet the black-shined shoes
That I could see with my head down.
Not quite too deaf to hear the cry
A silent sob, a quiet tear
A nameless dread, unspoken fear.

I first walked on, but then went back
That hovering hesitation when
You think you must have thought things false.
The grown-ups must know something else
To walk past stifled sobs, assured,
That this is someone else’s fault.
But she was in a sleeping bag
Her shaking hands held to her mouth
Her shoulders hunched against the cold
And heaving, choking, on the air.
Her downturned eyes were swollen, raw,
Her nostrils flared and cracked like straw.

I squatted down, and she looked up
Her eyes a damp apology
For breaking some unspoken rule
She wiped her face with dirty gloves
Then held the hand I offered, and
Sat up too straight against the wall.
She spoke to me with broken words
Lurching hoarsely from her throat
Until she could not speak at all
And cradled nothing to her chest.
Through wordless tears, I understood
The siren’s cry of motherhood.

I cannot see the thoughts behind
Her gritted teeth. I can’t prescribe
Her shaking to a simple truth.
It only distances her pain, to
Think it as a metaphor, say
Her woe was some deep well of doom
A spiral down, a gushing wound,
Or other highbrow things that don’t
Capture what she felt or knew
Who knows what Rachel felt or knew.
Her pain was real. Her pain was there.
I felt it in her matted hair.

I watched her chapped lips quivering
And wondered what words I would say
If I were forced to break the news.
A doctor standing, facing this
Bedraggled, gaunt, and withered girl
Could not say something overused
When she was harbouring inside
The hope of having one more life.
I don’t think I could disabuse
Her of that blind and desperate wish.
A meek request. A humble aim.
A purpose for this hellish game.

In three long months that girl would be
Out the cold and off the streets.
But in that time, more like than not,
The hope inside will rot, and join
Its two late siblings, cold and dead,
Begotten, but not made, instead
With memories of those forgot-
ten Lost and failed by grown-ups who
Had more important things to do.
Somewhere, I hope, her newborn cries
Rocked to sleep by loving arms
Warm, and safe, and out of harm

Somehow, I think not.