By, Wendiann Alfieri
For the girl named Tuesday
The mother screams as soon as they bring the newborn girl back into the room
he’s not looking at her child
She doesn’t care for physical pain
The girl named Tuesday, her eyes blue and bright
Her pupils are the stars against the blue background
Her mother is alone and doesn’t see them yet
She’s on the phone
she hears his voice
The baby wriggles in the arms of the staff crying as though she can understand
The mother, he’s Telling her he loves her
he wish he had a choice
But to tell the child he loves her
he hopes she can have a voice
he loves them all
he’s sorry he has to make this call
Tuesday will love to ice skate
She will love the winter
never go on beaches cause she hates the sand, cause there will be a time that her friend dumped a bucket of sand from the sandcastle mold onto Tuesday’s head by accident
The phone clicks off the mother is still screaming
Tuesday’s favorite year will be when she’s forty three
she’ll settle with her partner
Finally getting married
After their on and off had been continually on for a few years
The mother is flipping out now as the grave situation becomes graver
Even though Tuesday’s life is growing
Tuesday’s favorite thing to eat will be chocolate frosting
Which will nauseate her friends
And make them even more confused when she tells them she hates chocolate bars
she loves that gross frosting they always sell, store brand at the old food store that her mom will insist on buying all the groceries at.
The mother doesn’t know what’s happening
no one does right now
Long Island is where Tuesday is born
Tuesday’s first word will be her mother’s name
Ironically not saying “ mama” but saying her mothers name which is Beth
she’ll never call her mom not because she didn’t love her or anything but just cause it was her first word so why anything else?
The mother is given a syringe to calm her down in the hospital
Beth was just a secretary at a local podiatrists office
She always smelled like gingerbread cookies because of a perfume for kids for the holidays that she bought way too much of and loved so much she’d buy more every year
she was a world class spelling bee champion who purposely misspelled a word because she didn’t want to win and she’d always regret it, she’d study the dictionary for those things like it was the bible
Now though as she’s sedated
the confusion runs rampant through the hospital
she’ll never love those things quite the same way anymore
It will hurt to think of her secrets because only her husband knew them all.
in this hospital the drs and nurses are calling their families
so are all the other patients
Beth’s pain will hurt her worse when she wakes up
her love for that child
She’ll love the child forever
the child is all of him she has left
All throughout the world
There were marks and Tina and Anna’s and Kirks
Some who lived to tell the tale that caused them to be called a survivor
And no one will know the Beth before all of this, least of all Beth herself
Tuesday will never know what her mother felt that day
Of losing her husband and being alone
The mother
She’s so cold
But he is not
Tuesday will love to go shoe shopping
only at stores that don’t have sales
Cause she will have an expensive taste in where her shoes come from
Even though her mother would pretend to buy her Christmas present shoes from that store
And Tuesday she’ll never tell the difference
The day that Tuesday was born is hell for everyone
Across sea to shining sea
more phone calls were made
more footage was played
the more they understood
The less they wish they did
Eventually the mother will go home
With Tuesday to live on their own.
The mother will be single
For ever after this
But through her grief
She will love her daughter her daughter Tuesday
Tuesday was supposed to be named Vanessa, whose nickname would be Ness.
But now she is Tuesday
Because things change
And they will never fly
Or throw caution to the wind
Because after that Tuesday
No one ever felt safe enough and did.