{"id":18684,"date":"2023-06-11T14:35:24","date_gmt":"2023-06-11T19:35:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/?p=18684"},"modified":"2023-06-11T14:54:20","modified_gmt":"2023-06-11T19:54:20","slug":"call-sign-mother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/archives\/18684","title":{"rendered":"Call Sign: Mother"},"content":{"rendered":"

2023 Porch Prize Winner in Poetry<\/em><\/p>\n

We cloverleafed into love:<\/span>
\ntwo pilots, mutually attracted<\/span>
\nto hazard, to defying gravity,<\/span>
\nto the thrill of a bump<\/span>
\non an airspeed dial\u2014the push<\/span>
\nof the needle past Mach one, meaning:<\/span>
\nwe broke the speed of sound.<\/span><\/p>\n

When I met you, you were Cowboy.<\/span>
\nWe looped skies, flew upside down,<\/span>
\nbelted beneath our glass canopies;<\/span>
\noccupying a safe intimacy<\/span>
\nof distance. We burned fuel. Always, my<\/span>
\neyes on the ejection handles. \u201cHand grips<\/span>
\nraise,\u201d you\u2019d say. \u201cTriggers squeeze,\u201d
\nI\u2019d reply\u2014the boldface emergency<\/span><\/p>\n

procedure for how to escape,<\/span>
\nif needed. You were talking strictly<\/span>
\nAerobatics. And sex.<\/span>
\nThen, one day, you leave debrief<\/span>
\nlike a bullet train\u2014fly your long-<\/span>
\nbed Ford past dry West Texas<\/span>
\ncotton fields, red dust pluming<\/span>
\nbehind you like contrails\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

returning home to feed a quartet<\/span>
\nof new-sprung rabbits. Abandoned,<\/span>
\nyou think, in alfalfa grass. Found,
\nlike a ball of recovered yarn. Tucked<\/span>
\ninto the corner of an old shoebox<\/span>
\nstuffed with socks. The rabbits must<\/span>
\nknow your call sign has changed.<\/span>
\nNow, everyone calls you Mother.<\/span><\/p>\n

In my squad, they call me Mother,<\/span>
\ntoo. You\u2019ve called the vet, shopped<\/span>
\nfor three types of milk: condensed,<\/span>
\nraw, and goat. Eyedropper in your right<\/span>
\nhand, rabbit in left. Five feedings<\/span>
\na day keep them alive. You beat<\/span>
\nthe dawn. By noon,<\/span>
\nyou\u2019re back in bed at the rabbits\u2019 side.<\/span><\/p>\n

Sprawled out, spent. You fade<\/span>
\nto nap as sunlight warms<\/span>
\nthe room. Sated. Content.<\/span>
\nFatigue has won. And one by one,<\/span>
\nthey crawl inside your flight suit leg,<\/span>
\nburrow for warmth. There is so much<\/span>
\npower in your hands, holding<\/span>
\nthrottles, flying three feet from<\/span><\/p>\n

another jet\u2019s wings, bearing the weight<\/span>
\nof Gs, rolling upside-down in aileron rolls.<\/span>
\nYour jet\u2019s Talon wings like a knife<\/span>
\nslicing the slipstream with afterburner<\/span>
\nthrust. Raw. We\u2019re long-distance.<\/span>
\nWe talk by phone from different homes<\/span>
\nand live on separate bases.
\n\u201cThey die at night,\u201d you say, hoping one<\/span><\/p>\n

will make a fool of odds, disprove<\/span>
\nthe vet. You wake more often now.<\/span>
\n1 a.m., 3 a.m. \u201cA rabbit can startle itself<\/span>
\nto death,\u201d you say. A fact I didn\u2019t know.<\/span>
\nYou pray when drops of milk are all<\/span>
\nyou have to keep the chubby one alive<\/span>
\nfor one more day. And that is when I think,<\/span>
\nI will. I vow. Marry you, yes. Now,<\/span><\/p>\n

you hold the spade in your left hand,<\/span>
\nrabbit in your right, and dig a little red<\/span>
\nclay away\u2014a fourth small grave<\/span>
\nin the backyard, near the Bigelow Oak.<\/span>
\nTwo pilots, two mothers, breath<\/span>
\njoined, unaware of the course ahead.<\/span>
\nA rehearsal for absences yet to come.<\/span>
\nWe sojourn through the night.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Laura Joyce-Hubbard\u2019s work appears or is forthcoming in Poetry, The Iowa Review, Sewanee Review<\/em>, and elsewhere. She won The Iowa Review<\/em>\u2019s 2022 veteran writing award. Her nonfiction is recognized as Notable in Best American Essays<\/em> of 2022 and is an AWP nonfiction selection for Intro Awards. A former C-130 pilot, Laura served in the Air Force for twenty years. She lives with her family in Illinois, serves as a fiction editor for TriQuarterly<\/em>, and is the inaugural Highland Park Poet Laureate.<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2023 Porch Prize Winner in Poetry We cloverleafed into love: two pilots, mutually attracted to hazard, to defying gravity, to the thrill of a bump on an airspeed dial\u2014the push of the needle past Mach one, meaning: we broke the speed of sound. When I met you, you were Cowboy. We looped skies, flew upside […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2292,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[80],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Jypy-4Rm","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18684"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18711,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684\/revisions\/18711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}