Week 30 (Maternity Bathing Suit)

Forget those gilded mamas, 
she’s a magic marker Venus de Milo 

at the open swim, a cellulite bird 
of blub and doodles full of words, 

A-E-I-O-U and growing
a varicose cosmos 

of pantihoseless possibility, 
up to her anatomy in irregular stars, 

her daisy-decal polka-dot 
pliant bingo bottom buoyant enough

to balance an elephantine arabesque 
off the ladder, smile

at mister-smug-one shrunk 
in his trunks in front of 

her flagrant magenta bellyful 
of flutter kicks—O shaky bravura—

and drop, splashless, 
into water over her head.