When she steps onto the streetcar,
the passengers feel judged.
In this, for an instant all strangers are related.
A woman may offer her seat as if the pregnant woman were ill.
A man may sigh a nervous laugh to himself.
Standing near her, he can hear the other music of her body,
and it startles and embarrasses him:
his animal-self is waiting for signals from her
that his cocksure instincts can ordinarily understand.

Because few men celebrate the blood of another man’s child,
or cherish another man’s seed.
The root of his brain tells him: There must have been a chance:
There is always the chance it could have been me.
The loathing defeat of it that it wasn’t …

He turns away and looks out the window,
his hand a quivering fist at his mouth
as he chokes on his lust.