Moral Clarity

Sometimes I try to drive my childlessness like a Prius,
a grand gesture towards a clean future.
I imagine myself on open road, Sheryl Crow.
I pretend I am not green with envy, just green,

like, sustainable.
I don’t understand the first thing
about why we say what we say,
who we are trying to become by saying it.

I tickle a little socked foot
and even I know I am wild with wanting —
the sweaty press of baby bound to me,
the heat, just unbearable.

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Amy Wise Rothschild’s writing has appeared in The Bellevue Literary Review, The Atlantic, and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, among others. She is the 2024 winner of the Bellevue Literary Review Prize for Poetry. Originally from Maryland, Amy lives and writes in Cambridge, Massachusetts.