The Pregnant Woman

A sonnet, by Beverly Stock. Originally published on ClassicalPoets.org on March 28, 2019. It can be found here.

The Pregnant Woman nests a baby seed
 Who’s ever pressing on her very core
 While her body adapts to baby’s needs
 She’s feeling aches she’s never known before.

A linea alba marks a fibrous path,
 A vertical white line on her flesh
 Of God’s exacting hemispherical math,
 Where muscles and the forming child enmesh.

The Pregnant Woman cannot seem to sleep
 She warns that moods are swinging, family beware
 And in her waking hours, she tends to weep—
 The Pregnant Woman needs some extra care.

Long labor pushes her past vertigo
 Toward the deepest love she’ll ever know.