Julia C. Alter

The Basket

On a condom company’s website, a photo
of a woven basket holds two fluffy bunnies, just born.
 
A reasonably handsome bearded guy raises
an eyebrow. Slightly smirking for the camera to say
 
“Whoops! Babies”. There’s a trademark
on Momentum™. I’m so tired of irony.
 
What was I expecting from a condom website? They wink:
with the right barrier, anything can be avoided.
 
We ordered a small box of them months ago.
First with high hopes for your birthday,
 
then our anniversary. When that came and went
with nothing but dinner, we carried it
 
in the glove compartment to Florida
for fun nights in the festival tent.
 
Now the un-opened box is a permanent fixture--
a lamp that never gets turned on—on my side of the bed.
 
I am too busy being a mother. When I lay down
at night, my body buzzes with anxiety
 
over the tiny body that came out of me.
We can’t find a way back to the river
 
we used to know so well. Footprints melt
in muddy April snow. It’s almost Easter, again.
 
In the dark when your snoring is established, I put my hand
between my legs and find I am still woven shut.

--
Julia C. Alter is an MFA candidate in Poetry at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her poems can be found in, or are forthcoming from Palette Poetry, Crab Creek Review, Crab Orchard Review, The Boiler, Glass, SWWIM, CALYX, Memoir Mixtapes, Rogue Agent and elsewhere. She lives in Vermont with her partner and young son.