Oh, how it were!
Cutting a swath, a blank,
A stone resting on-chest; shadows dark on the wall
The hum of outside, of red windows.

I felt my heart pat like a rabbit’s,
A deep blue pulse inside me, but not mine,
A levitation, a placelessness:
I was Me, but only in the sense of the flesh.
I inhabited my body, but not my Self.

How useless are fingernails
When they are the only way out!
Claws shrunken and softened-down,
To scratch, to draw a single bead
Of cherry-red blood: for I did not hurt,
Could only push.

I awoke and my thumb was red
And my arm counted thirty-three
(Soon to be more).
A child, chewing her way out,
Hushed, hushed, pushed back into sleep,
Consciousness-gone-black.

Were I there, now.
That was not Me. I think.