{
 "id": "mina-loy/parturition",
 "title": "Parturition",
 "poet": "Mina Loy",
 "poet_slug": "mina-loy",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poetry",
 "book_slug": null,
 "book_kind": "compilation",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1914,
  "venue": "Trend (1914)",
  "note": null,
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://mina-loy.com/timelines/chronology-loy/"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/mina-loy_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uva.x002129491?urlappend=%3Bseq=396",
   "https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/17374476",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_others-a-magazine-of-the-new-verse_1916-07_3_1/page/27",
   "https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/17390662",
   "https://archive.org/details/othersanantholo01kreygoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cu31924022030351",
   "https://archive.org/details/littlereview07mcke/page/n199",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_others-a-magazine-of-the-new-verse_1917-04_3_6",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_dial_1921-06_70/page/672",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_dial_1921-08_71/page/n15",
   "https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.32106010168349",
   "https://archive.org/details/contact-collection-of-contemporary-writers/page/137",
   "https://personal.colby.edu/~isadoff/map/loy.doc",
   "https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/digital_objects/211477",
   "https://digitalcommons.whitworth.edu/transatlantic/1/"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 130,
  "n_stanzas": 12,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 77,
  "max_indent": 3
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 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I am the centre",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of a circle of pain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Exceeding its boundaries in every direction",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The business of the bland sun",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Has no affair with me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In my congested cosmos of agony",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From which there is no escape",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On infinitely prolonged nerve-vibrations",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or in contraction",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To the pin-point nucleus of being",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Locate an irritation without",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is within",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Within",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is without.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sensitized area",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is identical with the extensity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of intension",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I am the false quantity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the harmony of physiological potentiality",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To which",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gaining self-control",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I should be consonant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In time",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Pain is no stronger than the resisting force",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pain calls up in me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The struggle is equal",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The open window is full of a voice",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A fashionable portrait-painter",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Running up-stairs to a woman’s apartment",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sings",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“All the girls are tid’ly did’ly",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All the girls are nice",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Whether they wear their hair in curls",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Or⁠—”",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "At the back of the thoughts to which I permit crystallization",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The conception Brute",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The irresponsibility of the male",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "Leaves woman her superior Inferiority.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He is running up-stairs",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I am climbing a distorted mountain of agony",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Incidentally with the exhaustion of control",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I reach the summit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And gradually subside into anticipation of",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Repose",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which never comes.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For another mountain is growing up",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which goaded by the unavoidable",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I must traverse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Traversing myself",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Something in the delirium of night-hours",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Confuses while intensifying sensibility",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blurring spatial contours",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So aiding elusion of the circumscribed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That the gurgling of a crucified wild beast",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Comes from so far away",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the foam on the stretched muscles of a mouth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is no part of myself",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There is a climax in sensibility",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When pain surpassing itself",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Becomes exotic",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the ego succeeds in unifying the positive and negative poles of sensation",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Uniting the opposing and resisting forces",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In lascivious revelation",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Relaxation",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Negation of myself as a unit",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vacuum interlude",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "I should have been emptied of life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Giving life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For consciousness in crises races",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the subliminal deposits of evolutionary processes",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have I not",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Somewhere",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Scrutinized",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A dead white feathered moth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Laying eggs?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "A moment",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Being realization",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Can",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Vitalized by cosmic initiation",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Furnish an adequate apology",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For the objective",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Agglomeration of activities",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of a life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A leap with nature",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into the essence",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of unpredicted maternity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against my thigh",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Touch of infinitesimal motion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Scarcely perceptible",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Undulation",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Warmth moisture",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stir of incipient life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Precipitating into me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The contents of the universe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mother I am",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Identical",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With infinite Maternity",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Indivisible",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Acutely",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I am absorbed",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Into",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The was⁠—is⁠—ever⁠—shall⁠—be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of cosmic reproductivity",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Rises from the subconscious",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Impression of a cat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With blind kittens",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Among her legs",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Same undulating life⁠—stir",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I am that cat",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Rises from the sub-conscious",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Impression of small animal carcass",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Covered with blue-bottles",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "—Epicurean⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And through the insects",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Waves that same undulation of living",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Death",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I am knowing",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All about",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unfolding",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The next morning",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each woman-of-the-people",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tip-toeing the red pile of the carpet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Doing hushed service",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each woman-of-the-people",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wearing a halo",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A ludicrous little halo",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of which she is sublimely unaware",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}