Methodist Social Services sends mention
my maternal grandmother suffered
with arthritis, died of diverticulitis,
but there is nothing more.
The adoption agency’s report lists
my mother’s age, height, color of hair
at time of relinquishment.
The Adoptees’ Association tells me to
petition juvenile court for sealed records.
Instead, I fly the under-radar route, apply
to reunion registries, hope my arrow
of request makes data slide into one
vertical slot proving a half-sibling, nephew
by marriage or cousin-once-removed–
even a shirttail one–stretched their bow
and hit mine.
But within a month, all spinning stops.
Triplicate replies stack up and form
a buttress: No Matches Found.
My mother, my father, singly or together
leapt like deer into a tamarack woods
gone golden with sundown in September,
to their ongoing ready-made lives, to
other children they cherish.
Shoshauna Shy's poems have been made into videos, produced inside taxi cabs, and even decorated the hind quarters of city buses. She is also a flash fiction author — but that's a whole ‘nother story!
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