A Baby Was Born Today

A Baby Was Born Today

A baby was born today …
which should be a cause of joy.
She did not ask to be born.
She is the by-product
of the miracle called conception.
It doesn’t matter now whether
she resulted from a drunken tryst
in the backseat of a Buick
or whether she was carefully planned.
She exists. She is here now.

A baby was born today …
which should begin a glorious life.
But, her future is only partly hers
to shape. She has no control
over how her parents will treat her,
over whether they will truly love
and take good care of her,
or whether they will abuse her,
warp her mind, restrict her future.
Sheer accident of birth has
decided if she lives in happiness
or is impoverished and in misery.

A baby was born today ...
into a lifetime of failure to be filled
with crushed dreams and a broken heart.
Fate has dictated this baby girl
be born to a teenage, drug-addicted,
ignorant, unwed, unfit mother.
Through no fault of her own,
this baby was born stunted in mind
and body and wracked with pain.
This baby’s future will be bleak --
a life of want, to be unloved
and neglected as a child;
to be triply undernourished: mentally,
physically, plus spiritually;
to become a drop-out, hooked
on crack and alcohol to quiet
the hurt, hunger, and despair filling her days.
Pregnant at fifteen, twice arrested
for prostitution, she will die of an overdose,
feeling her life wasn’t worth the living.

A baby was born today …
but perhaps some babies truly would be
better off had they never been born,
despite what some people claim.