Sometimes I wish I could live inside the egg,
crawl inside it and mend the shell around me,
slowly shrink to almost nothing, just a red dot
in a yolk sea, looking up at the white rock sky.

 

I would lie in the wet silence of the egg, enjoy
the feel of the gelatinous air on my few cells,
as the warmth from the Great Mother Animal
radiated toward me from just beyond the shell.

 

Inside the egg, it wouldn’t be like it is out here,
where I’m insignificant, trivial, even less than
a red dot, surrounded by other less-than-red-dots,
though mostly they don’t see themselves that way.

 

I would have the whole reality to myself, a universe
created only for me, and I would know I’m special,
something loved, something at the center of things,
for everything that surrounds me would nourish me.

 

And when I grew too large for it I would burst forth,
crack the whole universe with my incredible beak
and shake off the shells of the stars with a sense
that this new place I’ve found must also be mine.