Poetry: Let’s Make a Baby With Science

This poem gets around...

Photo by Aditya Chinchure on Unsplash.

My most published poem is also my angriest poem. A poem borne of frustration and anger and heartbreak and despair and not knowing if we would ever call motherhood our own. As Mother’s Day in the UK—officially known as Mothering Sunday—has just passed, I thought I’d share this poem, from the days, like those five years ago, when we just had embryos in the freezer and a fertility clinic closed by a global pandemic. Thankfully, there has been a lot of life since then: both for our family as well as for this poem: ‘Let’s Make a Baby with Science'.

This poem was first published in the journal Impossible Archetype and then became the final poem in my debut pamphlet (more on that in a minute). After that, I was deeply honoured to be asked by poets and editors Mary Jean Chan and Andrew McMillan for the poem to be included in their collection 100 Queer Poems in 2022. I was then delightfully surprised—if a little baffled—to be queried if it could also be included in the anthology 365 Poems for Life. This big glitzy book from Bluebird at Pan Macmillan is part of a series by the editor Allie Esiri and it came out in October 2023.

Isn’t it pretty? 365 Poems for Life by Allie Esiri

Finally, after all these months, I’ve decided now would be a good time to share the news. (Publicist friends, please don’t hate me. I’ll do better next time!) This is because, as promised in last month’s quarterly reading list, I’ll be sharing poems of mine in the interim months for paid subscribers. I hope you enjoy—and do check out 365 Poems for Life next time you happen upon it in your favourite bookshop…