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    The Adoption Papers
    The Adoption Papers
    The Adoption Papers
    Ebook87 pages1 hour

    The Adoption Papers

    By Jackie Kay

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    About this ebook

    Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Jackie Kay tells the story of a black girl's adoption by a white
    Scottish couple from three different viewpoints: the mother,the birth mother and the daughter. This unique and honest volumeof poems has been adapted for radio. Also included in thebook are new poems reflecting issues of sexuality, Scottishness and being working-class.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBloodaxe Books
    Release dateJul 21, 2011
    ISBN9781780370392
    The Adoption Papers
    Author

    Jackie Kay

    Jackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. A poet, novelist and writer of short stories, she has enjoyed great acclaim for her work for both adults and children. Her novel, Trumpet, won the Guardian Fiction Prize. She has published three collections of stories with Picador, Why Don’t You Stop Talking, Wish I Was Here, and Reality, Reality; three poetry collections, Fiere. Bantam and May Day; and her memoir, Red Dust Road. From 2016-21 she was the third modern Makar, National Poet for Scotland. She lives in Manchester and is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Salford.

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      Book preview

      The Adoption Papers - Jackie Kay

      PART ONE: 1961-1962

      Chapter 1: The Seed

      I never thought it would be quicker

      than walking down the mainstreet

      I want to stand in front of the mirror

      swollen bellied so swollen bellied

      The time, the exact time

      for that particular seed to be singled out

      I want to lie on my back at night

      I want to pee all the time

      amongst all others

      like choosing a dancing partner

      I crave discomfort like some women

      crave chocolate or earth or liver

      Now these slow weeks on

      I can’t stop going over and over

      I can’t believe I’ve tried for five years

      for something that could take five minutes

      It only took a split second

      not a minute or more.

      I want the pain

      the tearing searing pain

      I want my waters to break

      like Noah’s flood

      I want to push and push

      and scream and scream.

      When I was sure I wrote a short note

      six weeks later – a short letter

      He was sorry; we should have known better

      He couldn’t leave Nigeria.

      I missed him, silly things

      his sudden high laugh,

      His eyes intense as whirlwind

      the music he played me

      Chapter 2: The Original Birth Certificate

      I say to the man at the desk

      I’d like my original birth certificate

      Do you have any idea what your name was?

      Close, close he laughs. Well what was it?

      So slow as torture he discloses bit by bit

      my mother’s name, my original name

      the hospital I was born in, the time I came.

      Outside Edinburgh is soaked in sunshine

      I talk to myself walking past the castle.

      So, so, so, I was a midnight baby after all.

      I am nineteen

      my whole life is changing 

      On the first night

      I see her shuttered eyes in my dreams

      I cannot pretend she’s never been

      my stitches pull and threaten to snap

      my own body a witness

      leaking blood to sheets, milk to shirts

      On the second night

      I’ll suffocate her with a feather pillow

      Bury her under a weeping willow

      Or take her far out to sea

      and watch her tiny eight-pound body

      sink to shells and reshape herself.

      So much the better than her body

      encased in glass like a museum

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