Small things (tw: miscarriage)

It started with a stain, rust-dark,  

smudged on white cotton—small as a coin.  

A pain low in my stomach,  

a fist unclenching,  

the slow ache of something leaving.  

I counted back—  

weeks folded like laundry,  

days misplaced in diaries,  

the morning sickness I called a bad egg,  

the tiredness blamed on winter.  

On the bathroom floor, tiles cold as milk,  

I bled out what I didn’t know I had,  

clots thick as pomegranate seeds,  

a life I never meant to make  

slipping through my fingers.  

After, I held my stomach,  

hollow as a pocket, empty as a glove.  

Googled things in the dark,  

read words I didn’t want to own:  

miscarriage. loss. tissue.  

Outside, a robin scratched at the soil,  

digging for worms, its belly bright  

as the blood in the bowl of the toilet.  

I watched it work,  

listened to the ticking pipes,  

the creak of the settling house—  

small things, still here.