Andreanna Dais-Patterson

I pulled down my knickers and no longer found her there waiting for me. She was late, very very late. There were no more burrows left to explore and I found myself evicted from the complex warren. This business of bleeding finished in the blink of an eye. Bursting from deep within me in girlhood and throughout my woman years, the rainbow of reds ran their course. My canvas is blank. Space fills the space now.

A bunny was once born still, ready for burial. A boy, beautiful, like you wouldn't believe. Being born in the year of the bunny is the luckiest of the lunar years, or so they say. And before you know it, that bunny's back again for another cycle around the sun. But this time I'm barren. Bunny-less right down to my bones. They tell me it's a second spring, but I don't even remember the first.

Foggy-headed and fearful: the fat flees from right under my nose. My skin sits like a bare arse on boards, the cushion long gone. Will my bones become brittle? Will my fanny flake away bit by fucking bit? Or is all of that shit a myth, man-made to kick you to the curb and keep you there.

I sit back and settle right into myself. Might as well, nowhere else left to go mate.  Outside there's bouncing aplenty. Babies born in abundance. Popping them out like Pringles they are. I'm grateful for the view, and don't get me wrong, I'm not bitter. But I am done and that needs to be acknowledged. I'ma make like the Mayans and move into something other than motherhood. Something like a lover and a leader, at the centre of all that's good. Guiding like the full moon bright on that dark, dark sea.

I'm gonna do it, you just watch me.