Published in Overland Issue 205 Summer 2011 · Uncategorized Mary: A Fiction Eileen Chong [E]ither destroy the embryo in the womb, or cast it off when born Mary Wollstonecraft, 1792 No light streamed through the shutters when I woke this morning. I knew you had taken root this past night. I felt a curious quickening of my womb – with Fanny, I’d thought it the low anger of the crowds roiling in the streets, or the dull pull of hunger in the orange days of summer. I left the warm bed and your father, crossing the room in bare feet. My pamphlet read: Men ought to maintain the women whom they have seduced. At my desk in my nightclothes I wondered: What manner of child might you become, born of the coupling of minds as much as bodily passions between man and woman not bound by church or ritual but by poetry, argument and love? I imagine your violent entry, your searing cry, your relentless suckle at my breast. If you be female, I shall name you Mary. Perhaps when there are enough of us, Mary, we shall call the sky, the seas, the stars, the moon into being: we shall write of something that is wholly woman. We shall create without man. In my mind’s eye I see your perfect, infant fingers curl around a pen. Eileen Chong Eileen Chong is an Australian poet. She is the author of nine books. We Speak of Flowers is forthcoming from UQP in 2025. Website: www.eileenchong.com.au More by Eileen Chong › Overland is a not-for-profit magazine with a proud history of supporting writers, and publishing ideas and voices often excluded from other places. If you like this piece, or support Overland’s work in general, please subscribe or donate. Related articles & Essays 22 April 2024 · Gaming Game-death in infinite game-worlds: Darkest Dungeon 2 Josie/Jocelyn Suzanne Death is the ultimate stamp of value. It was invented to sell arcade-like 1 Up repetition to the home market. To read politics in videogames is to learn to read necropolitically, which is why gamers don’t like politics. 19 April 2024 · Friday Fiction Stilted J.E “Mahal” Cuya One hour after midnight. Everyone in rooms. Living room – dark. Table look like monsters. Like death. TV on stand. Netflix Logo. No one watching. Residents asleep. They have dementia.