Cartwheeling through the sky and holding our wombs like bubble wands, Amy Kalbun’s short prose piece gives the reader fantastical material to work with, to imagine ourselves as mothers, as daughters, as pregnant, as growing. We’re so honoured to have Amy’s piece and Mithila’s photo featured with us, and we hope you’re as excited as we are by this strange, small masterpiece

The trick to using a tri-string wand is to hold and release, let its chords cradle the bubble formula the way

your legs and hips cradle your weighted womb. This is how your bubble is born, and her birth – don’t be

silly, of course it’ll be a girl – will stretch you wide, sprawl your limbs loose, make your tri-string tremble

in the wind; and when you catch your reflection in her rounded cheek, you’ll wonder if you’ve ever felt so

breakable. At first, you’ll fear her falling, stay close as she sails around the park, and hope the formula is

thick enough to keep her afloat. To prove she’s stronger than you think, she’ll cartwheel past the dogs that

chase her and somersault over the boys with sticks, rainbows muddying her see-through skin as she

splashes through the sky. Later, she’ll grow longer, learn to curve through air, and you’ll bite your lip

when she winds through the copse beside the baseball diamond, dodging branches and letting pine trees

stroke her back. It won’t be long before you’ve travelled the park together, and she has nowhere new to go.

Then she’ll vault a fence into someone’s backyard, slipping past houses and onto the street, while you sniff

your fingers for traces of formula you hoped would never vaporize. Your tri-string will be slack, and for a

moment, you’ll feel empty. But remember that the trick is to hold and release; hold and release; hold,

release.

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Visual by Mithila Rajavel