from paradise
This morning I wiped my toddler clean of his shit while he squirmed and I blinked against the pain in my head.
This morning I worried about how much writing I would get done, because my lover and my child were late leaving for crèche.
This morning, I thought Fuck, did I get paid? (I have to pay for the second half of my root canal today.)
This morning I began to scroll, and I saw a child vibrating with shock, soiling gauze wrapped about his bloodied head.
This morning I thought, again, of something Daisy Johnson posted in January—
‘One day this might be our children and videos of them dying will have as little affect as dust.’
This morning I asked myself what appeal I would make, to god or the devil or both, walking down a street which is in fact my son’s open air grave?
This morning, I thought Paradise. That is the word for this life I am living. A gift handed to me and not some other woman. Not tens of thousands of other women.
Paradise, Paradise.
My scalded hand.
My impossible work.
A drill wielded against my tooth, long dead at the root.
How is it that I am being born into Paradise each and every day?
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