End of the line: An exploration into the creation and challenges of infertility poetry.

This article examines the challenges of writing about infertility, an often-taboo and silenced aspect of motherhood within Western pronatalist culture, through the lens of infertility poetry. It analyzes how contemporary poets Julia Copus, Gerrie Fellows, and Kerry Priest use techniques such as linear narratives based on the in vitro fertilization (IVF) process, medical discourse, and the extended metaphor of the womb as home to give language and presence to infertility's defining absence and intangibility. The author also reflects on their own poetry, which employs visual form and bodily symptom imagery related to Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) to represent infertility's silence and lack. The article highlights the scarcity of infertility poetry compared to typical motherhood narratives and advocates for expanding discourse to normalize and better articulate the multifaceted experiences of infertility.