That Three-Tusked Beast

I wasn’t to know
that it was a three-tusked
beast; that there was not one,
not two, but three
that grew the seed of me.

Back then, who’d ever heard
of that unlikely jungle lore?
In school there was room
for two, no more: a mum
and a dad. My skin grew hot

when it was time to present
our tree. On both sides
I wrote ma mère in extra-small,
traced their faces faint, idly
added cousins I’d never known

to an ivory branch. I could never
quite get to the nub of truth–
always rubbing the animal
out, never letting it wander in to flick
its tail, wave its trunk around.

My inside-beast was so strong.
It didn’t let intruders in. It didn’t
take kindly to being found out.

May Grier (she/her) was born and lives in London and works a nurse. This is her first published poem.