Daniel E Haislet

In the birthing room they drive a syringe into your spine
while I dress in a paper suit a few hallways away
where a nurse is watching me closely because I told her
I feel queasy thinking about what it took to get here
beyond the silent weeping we kept from each other
waiting for news that even one of the treatments had worked.

Treatment is the word for a now faceless doctor weekly injecting
my semen directly passed your cervix;
semen I deposited in a plastic cup in our living room
-so I could use the tv for porn while you were at work-
and transported across gray Portland
in a paper bag on my passenger seat.

It wasn’t until the money was used up on all those treatments
that we gave up on trying. And everything became fragile.
Now they ask me to cut the cord. Of course, I can’t.