Amnio Poem by Doug Lane

Everyone said
we were the cutest couple,
and if you don't believe me,
just look at the photos.

We had a fabulous wedding
and every reason
to celebrate the future,
which is perhaps why
I didn't get
the amniocentesis
though I was
34.

Iris was born
10 months later;
it was instantly clear
she had Down Syndrome.
Billy hung around
for a couple years.
Though he loved me
and loved Iris, too,

he just couldn't take it
and tripped the light fantastic
out of us.
He remarried
within a couple years
to a girl
who looked just like me,
a shabby knockoff
of me.

I would've gotten outta Dodge, too,
but being the mother,
I was stuck.
The thought of Iris,
abandoned,
alone in the world
was unbearable.

So I dug in for the long haul.
Here it is,
20 years later,
and no vestige
left
of my young adulthood.

Iris
is a young adult
in an institutional living
situation,
and no,
I didn't find another man.
The package
of me and Iris
scared off
the good prospects.

Now that Iris
is grown,
I'm not the man magnet
I was.

While the life I'm living
is not the one I dreamed of,
I'm still Iris's mother,
and love her.
She's the best hearted girl
in the world.

My life has been hard,
really hard.
I wouldn't change
a thing,
except
sometimes I wonder

what my other life
would've been like
- - the life in which
I got that amnio
in my 15th week.