This Ultrasound

Lory Bedikian

Ask the woman about it. Ask the woman Where it is that they found something growing.

(This is not about impregnation. Go beyond the obvious). Unless you can’t because you’re impressed by anything

Everyone’s following. (Godmothers, help me). You see, there are floorboards in a woman.

There are things that grow inside of her Like the letter left there since the 70’s

The guitar riff that almost got her pregnant Hoods of cars, backseats and now we’re getting

Obvious again. Let’s put it this way. Don’t
Ask the rich kid, spoiled brat, what is this

And that, a boy who never did shit in his life Was polished every night along with the silver.

No wonder he hums. Just like a baby. Dammit, these boys know how to play the game.

Their coffee always has a name on it. Never Have they lifted plain styrofoam with beautiful black

Steam, black answers risen to their lips Like the worker, the one who built the chair

His little ass sits on day after day, spewing out Words like wedding rice. The woman gets dressed

After the doctor exits the examination room. The spoiled brat is miles away, eating something

In a cardboard box with a name on it. He thinks He’s clever. He’s got a new jacket that matches

The eyes of his mother. Everything that he said Today was a lie. Ask the woman about it.

Lory Bedikian’s The Book of Lamenting was awarded the Philip Levine Prize for Poetry. Her newer work is published in Tin House, Border Lines: Poems of Migration (Knopf, 2020), and on Poets.org. Her work has been shortlisted for Ploughshares and appears in the newly released Spring 2021 issue of Boulevard.