{"id":366,"date":"2026-04-29T22:11:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T22:11:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/?page_id=366"},"modified":"2026-04-29T22:11:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T22:11:17","slug":"mother-and-infant","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/poetry\/mother-and-infant\/","title":{"rendered":"Mother and Infant"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brandon Townsend<\/span><\/h1>\n

Infant:<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

You birthed me thoughtlessly,<\/span><\/p>\n

To appease a god that never showed any care for you.<\/span><\/p>\n

When you look in my eyes\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

It is vacantly.<\/span><\/p>\n

When your heart beats\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

It is tonelessly.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now I suffer. Because my body neglects me,<\/span><\/p>\n

As you do.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Mother:<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

You were conceived by me and a breeze.<\/span><\/p>\n

Without any opportunity for escape\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

It was my religious duty to carry and birth you.<\/span><\/p>\n

Given by an indifferent god,<\/span><\/p>\n

Who for my entire life looks through me,<\/span><\/p>\n

Then squints dismissively,<\/span><\/p>\n

Then looks away.<\/span><\/p>\n

And that is how I most closely understand love.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brandon Townsend Infant: You birthed me thoughtlessly, To appease a god that never showed any care for you. When you look in my eyes\u2014 It is vacantly. When your heart beats\u2014 It is tonelessly. Now I suffer. Because my body neglects me, As you do. \u00a0 Mother: You were conceived by me and a breeze.… <\/p>\n

Read more Mother and Infant<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"parent":21,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_theme","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-366","page","type-page","status-publish","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":367,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/366\/revisions\/367"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/21"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/euphemism.illinoisstate.edu\/21-2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}