Lisa Ampleman
The Three-Year-Old in the Fertility Clinic Waiting Room
declares he’s
Superman, swoops
to the trash can,
scrambles onto
a chair and tramples
a magazine
as he stomps
his feet, nearly
losing a sandal,
jubilant in
his defeat of
the villain,
is shushed by
his flustered mother
as she tries to fill
in an endless form,
hurtles from
end table to
brochure rack and
back again, skids
to a stop below
the pastel floral
wall, the video
screen that
alternates between
a rosy baby
and examples
of payment plans.
Imp, you are
an aberration here.
Nonhypothetical,
noisy, you are what
we bystanders
do not hope
and hope for.
Lisa Ampleman reads “The Three-Year-Old in the Fertility Clinic Waiting Room”
Lisa Ampleman is the author of a chapbook and three full-length books of poetry, including Mom in Space (forthcoming 2024) and Romances (2020), both with LSU Press. Her poems and essays have appeared recently in journals such as 32 Poems, Colorado Review, Ecotone, Image, Shenandoah, and Southern Review. She is the managing editor of The Cincinnati Review and poetry series editor at Acre Books.