Who is she that looketh forth as the morning,
fair as the moon, clear as the sun,
and terrible as an army with banners?
Song of Solomon 6:10 KJV
Her look is anything but clear
a vacant beaten stare, slight fear;
She finds it hard to concentrate
upon her swelling change of state.
The gaze within her drop-out eyes
makes diapers float in teenage skies
where infant-formula rains down
while strollers crawl through baby-town.
Sweet nubile thing, your growing seed
will reap a crop of constant need.
For now, let’s hope it plays out well
for baby-daddy Gabriel.
Or was he Adam to your Eve ?
(scenario easier to conceive.)
He lost his rib — became your man;
you spread your legs and life began.
CONNECT/HOOK 
I know young people who still have this attitude in their twenties. They seem to have almost a total disconnect between sexuality and pregnancy and no consideration for the why a family needs to be built on a good foundation. Everything is reduced to instant gratification and the disaster that follows seems a complete surprise. We have failed in conveying so many important messages to the younger generation.
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Excellent commentary.
I work around a lot of teen and young urban mothers. My poem was inspired by some of the clueless gazes I have beheld in the eyes of clients. Not all are that way – some are making a valiant effort and should be commended. But many are quite clueless and utterly state-dependent.
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NM has it’s own inner-city problems in the most rural areas of all but it’s the same trap. Too much ‘help’ robs people of their dignity and it is passed on from one generation to the next. Child abuse is epidemic here.
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I thought the teen pregnancy rate was high here in the Northeast – but it is even higher in the SW. I had the dubious privilege of living in Pinal County AZ in the late 1990’s which, at that time, was one of the highest teen pregnancy rates in the nation. Very “traditional and family-oriented” societies indeed…
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Traditionally, people have married at a younger age here due mostly, to the pioneer type culture and lifestyle that was in place up until the sixties. We had culture shock here at that time when the modern culture swooped in. Instead of getting married young, kids instead, became sexually active. The messages of free sex without consequence in the media, over-ride everything else.
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Teen pregnancy is also a lucrative industry !
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Yes, it is…
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Well expressed!
Sad when a number of girls dropping out of high school to drop offspring has become the norm.
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In a tribal pre-industrial society it would not be such a problem. In our current culture it is a major setback. I fear we now have a permanent plebeian underclass as Rome also had.
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And we all know what became of decadent Rome!
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Ever seen the film Satyricon by Fellini?
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Rome fell, it’s true, but only after more than a thousand years, and that’s only if you don’t count the Byzantines, who were, after all, only the continuation of the Eastern Empire. Count them, and it’s 2 thousand +. Decadence can take forever to fall; it only looks precipitous in retrospect.
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SO sad, so true. History books make one think the end was calamitous and sudden – but it has always been an agonizing and depressing transition.
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And probably invisible to boot.
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