Letter to a Child Never Born

Chip Dameron

March 26, 2023

You were destined to die one day.

So, of course, are we. But your end

came before you took a first breath,

innocent, unaware, floating 

in your warm amniotic sea,

doomed by the genes that produced you:

missing bones in your shortened arms

and legs, spinal stenosis, fused 

joints, abnormal growth in your skull.

Severe skeletal dysplasia,

neonatal ultrasounds showed,

a fatal prognosis. We mourned

your loss yet hope your cell samples

give researchers greater insight

into this terrible outcome.

If your essence is wandering

somewhere in the cosmic ether,

listen for the love this message 

sends. It is all we can say now.

Chip Dameron’s latest book is Relatively Speaking, a two-poet collection with Betsy Joseph. He lives in Georgetown, Texas.