The off switch

Two point two children.
"Oh we are going for the third to try for a boy."
"Couldn't possibly go through that again."
"Even numbers, so we wanted four."

I cried when my husband got a vasectomy.
I was forty two and was onto number eight.
I know that the little switch that tells us,
That we have now produced sufficient progeny,
In my case, is faulty.

I know I'm not alone.
I know elderly mothers who track down the new mothers in the supermarket,
Just to have that fix of newborn baby smell.
I watch them absentmindedly ruffle the head of a passing toddler.

We recognise each other.
Those women and I.
We know that when we are sitting 'ga ga' in the nursing home.
That we will be the ones grasping a baby doll to our flabby breasts.