Dayna Patterson Meeting with the Prosthetics Unit They are careful to use the words residual limb and sound limb never stump or good leg always prosthetic and never fake we heft the fake leg made of metal and molded plasticine a socket for the stump it’s heavier than we imagined but then they remind us a leg is heavy They talk of phantom pain and sensation how they use a mirror placed between the thighs to trick the brain the sound limb flexing and stretching while the amputee looks at its reflection They talk about soreness of sit bones…
Author: Mom Egg Review
Kara Melissa Cerebral Palsy Took All the Words from My Son “If you listen you can hear me. My mouth is open, and I am singing.” -“Fathers and Sons” from Mortal Remains by Patrick Lane I imagine my son. Trying so hard to get a sound out. His mouth is open. His soft, red lips shaped in a big O. Many strangers mistake it as a yawn. “Oh, he’s tired.” No, he’s not, I think to myself. But I smile and walk on. Sometimes it’s just easier. I always choose carefully who is worth ‘the conversation,’ the one that…
Julia B. Levine Septic Shock Because he’s been working hard to stay alive, my grandson’s late to take his first steps, say his first words (dada, hi), his hands inventing a sideways wave for both bird and fish, and he’s so happy at home, but then midnight, his parents race him to the ER, the intensive care team shooting bolus after bolus into his arteries shutting down, his mother beside him, whispering it will be okay in tone and touch, while the surgeon threads a tube down his throat, pumps in breath, antibiotics, sedatives, opiates, and he sways again…
Arlene Naganawa At the Children’s Hospital The zones are named Ocean, Mountain, River. Post-surgery: Forest. Elevator: Deer. She cries for water, a sip of ice. Needles, tubes. Please, morphine. Please, a cracker. The gift shop sells balloons. Unicorn, cloud. Get well soon. She can’t read—she’s two. I lift the bear cub-printed gown– catheter filling. Sutures I can’t see. A preschooler in a wheelchair spins in the elevator. I ride down a floor in Frog. Soft belly. Skin like powder. Morphine bolus, please. Arlene Naganawa’s full-length collection, I Weave a Nest of Foil, was published in 2024 by Kelson…
Carly Butler Resting Heart Rate After 16 hours of chaos – The daily hustle of begging You (and your sister) to eat, To wash, To dress, To be gentle – The house is finally quiet. You’ve been asleep for an hour, And I’m wishing I was too. But first, the propranalol: The beta blocker that’s been Telling your restless heart To pump the brakes a little Ever since you were born. Every 8 hours for the past 8 years, Your tongue accepts syringe without pause. Your dad gives the morning dose, Your aunt the afternoon, And without waking you…
Kathryn Satterfield Rare You find the old man hunched over your baby in the semi-darkness of the neonatal intensive care unit. A chorus of beeps and blips serenade them, this man and boy. The hospital hums, quieter now that it is evening. “He’s so alert,” the old man says, peering into your baby’s face. His voice is filled with awe. He is not unkind, this old man. It is not his fault he doesn’t know why your baby is struggling to breathe. The old man picks up a tiny foot, runs his finger along the extra pads of skin…
Robin McGee Burns Alternate Names for Heart Mom after Danez Smith diagram-collector (staple them together and you get a flip-chart animation) insurance-checker appointment-scheduler worrier cradler last-minute-stalling-in-the-kitchen-food-prepper buzzer-holder tropical-fish-in-the-fish-tank-watcher photo-documenter daughter breast-milk-stock-piler guilty-conscience-date-goer out-of-body-weak-kneed morning-rotation team member forgetter-of-appropriate-acronyms-(CICU? CPICU?)-wing-dweller take-your-own-mom-out-and-about-to-tourist-attractions-like-Pike-Place-Market-goer distracter cafeteria-meal-eater check-casher (thanks, Dad – we ate it all in six days, disbelieving) walking-the-grounds-mushroom-spotter AA-meeting-goer sister-in-sobriety-gift-book-receiver cell-phone-dropper invitation-extender presidential-debates-on-tv-watcher doorway-stander hallway-pacer sofa-sleeper mastitis-avoider (heat-pack handler, breast massager) in-room-shower-taker hospital-gift-shop-sweatpants-buyer forgetter hand-my-baby-over-er fall-down-in-the-hallway-er helped-back-up-by-my-wife-er hope-upon-hope-I-get-to-keep-being-a-mother-er Robin McGee Burns (she/they) is a queer, divorced, and disabled writer living and gardening in Lincoln, Nebraska. Robin is the parent of a donor-conceived…
MER Mixed-Genre Literary Folio Guest Editor Sarah Dalton Being a mother or parent of a disabled child and/or a child with complex medical needs is one of the most rewarding experiences. It is also one of the most challenging. When your parenting journey includes a significant presence of hospitals, doctors, specialists, medications, tests and more tests, surgeries, ongoing medical treatments, a variety of therapies, etc. your conception of parenting expands. Ideas like tenderness and care modify to include tasks like daily medication administering and post-surgical pain management. Typical markers of child development like growth charts or milestones become meaningless…
Congrats to our nominees! POETRY Anna Abraham Gasaway – The Kenmore Refrigerator Elinor Ann Walker – I will hunger Nicole Greaves – Scars R. Erica Doyle – Wander Caridad Moro-Gronlier – For My 21-Year-Old Son, Who Cals Me on The Day Roe V. Wade is Overturned Natasha Herring – To Bake a Black Boy with a Dash of Dyslexia PROSE Harriet Bailiss – The Line
Mary Specker Stone Eclipse of the Super Flower Blood Moon Not even super moon can catch the toddler tossed in play whose leg the hard floor fractures. Fine China plate, broken moon can’t sleep. Ice cream moon melts in remorse’s heat. Baseball moon hurls hail from the sky. Again and again, the scene pummels mind’s eye. Laundry moon, white as bleached linen, but for this new stain in it, indelible, these new parents think, yet scarcely visible on a lunar scale. We grandmothers tell our own guilty tales: the time we spilled scalding coffee on the baby, or locked…