Fifteen Little Poems About My Life. Poem by Charlotte Ballard

Lift my up skirt and let me see there,
A whisper in the dark,
No one’s there.
No one except eyes that see
Deep, dark, dangerous, bare.

Candy to bribe a child
–not mine. A year
Is enough to turn the
Babe into a little boy
That belongs to someone else.

Failure.

Tears.

Eyes that dry,
Just like my heart.

Roll over and hide
In sofa cushions
Kept hidden and deep.
Here, here, do the medicines come.

Tangled hair,
An angry sweep,
A broken oven.
A shattered cup.

Touch here. I say.
Touch here, I want to say.
Touch here, I don’t say.
Touch here, I never say.

Lettuce weighs more
Than thighs that break there
And there, and even there.
Pass me the sink.

I lie. To myself
To something unfinished
Here and here
And here, and there.
Especially here