A Poem by Lisa McCabe

Jacqueline

With little chance that it will keep
you choose what first comes to your mind
and write the letters of her name,
this baby you will leave behind

entrusted to the care of those
who will erase it straight away,
yet what mother would not hope
she might possess all it conveys –

beauty refined, yet au courant,
sheer elegance, old wealth, and grace,
soft spoken, stylish, mind attuned,
a daughter in her proper place.

Say ‘Jacqu-e-line’ – it glides like silk –
a cool caress, but there a snag,
a stocking that will slide and catch
upon a newly shaven leg,

then set aside resignedly,
(a tear now runs the whole way through);
there is no mending what you did
nor what you are compelled to do.

You dress her in a knitted suit
(pink, the fashion of the time)
to hand her over to the nurse –
you hesitate – Love’s paradigm

shifts and cries against your breast;
you sound its syllables and then
turn your face toward the wall
and never speak the name again.

Lisa McCabe lives in Lahave, Nova Scotia. She has published poetry, reviews, and essays in The Sewanee Review, Front Porch Republic, The Orchards Poetry Review, HCE Review, The Dark Horse, and the A3 Review, among other print and online journals.