Laurel Benjamin

Laurel Benjamin is a Cider Press Review Book Award finalist. She is active with the Bay Area Women’s Poetry Salon, curates Ekphrastic Writers, and is a reader for Common Ground Review. Current and upcoming publication: Pirene’s Fountain, Lily Poetry Review, Cider Press Review, Taos Journal of Poetry, Gone Lawn, Nixes Mate. Pushcart Prize nominee, Laurel holds an MFA from Mills College. She invented a secret language with her brother. Find her at: laurelbenjamin.com 

Nine Months Post-October 7

Months ago the obgyn cauterized      to repair a surgical error
After     I sat in dusk      under the magnolia      swallowtail
washing iridescent

And now
               it’s enough      to sit down to new fabric      washed and ironed
sewing machine fitted      slender thread      seaming a natural slant      to the skirt
running along wide hips

Wind scrapes the window      when I lament women in another country
taken hostage nine months ago      chained to an olive tree      branches      a string-tied
bouquet      and further      to houses where men command

I want      to picture instead      new trees
planted on a hillside      salt clustering the edge      dissolving      and the sea beyond
reflective

And each granule of my body says
                                                      bring home the young women pregnant

Today my husband asks       did the doctor appointment go well      and I groan
Right you’ve never seen an obgyn      not even

where gestation      is a threat
                                       where swallowtail wings      batter the air
July already gone to seed