Not like a splitting
headache but more
literal, an actual cleaving in
two.

At first, a liquescence of
insides as they shift and rearrange
slowly, like magma beneath the ocean
floor, into more permanent things:

A self that holds inside her a turbulent
planet -- tight-fisted as a compulsive
gambler holding the dice in a sweaty fist, knowing
if she lets go too soon, she will lose. Hold
on too long, and the game will escape her.

Surely, this gravid body is but a sheet
over a hillock against the human
landscape, and the division now --
only a slight rending of the soul, but
how I already know the distance

we must travel, and if only you
will go with me that far, I can show you in
this fabric that no matter how carefully we
sew up the damage, we will always be
able to feel the tear.