LITTLE GIRL
Blithe Spirit, Volume 34, Number 1
I am eight years old. My hair is thin, I have short legs. Mum says short hair suits you, it is so much easier to care for. I wear lederhosen, dungarees, jeans. At carnival, the other girls dress up as princesses.
daisy wreaths
from a light blue eggshell
oozing gold
My best friend has a doll’s house. It is fully equipped with electronic lights, wallpaper, elegant dark furniture. Her many Barbies live there, wearing tailored ball gowns.
For my next birthday I ask for a Barbie. Mum says no. They are bad dolls because they are too beautiful. They are wrongly beautiful. I want to be wrongly beautiful. I am wrong because I want that. Mum says you are beautiful the way you are. I half-smile.
abandoned bus stop
i wait in the ev'ning rain
with two umbrellas
Five minutes into the Barbie movie, the tears of my inner little girl run down my face—
first mild night
all the field flowers
black*
*Kingfisher Journal, Issue #8, October 2023
CASTLING, PAWN PROMOTION, EN PASSANT*
The Other Bunny, July 29, 2024
Rules, I hate them
and they should die.
swift tailoring our fair wind
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pi & anne 