Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Harriet, Seventeen

A small tossed roiling glee in her tummy, a
small sea, green as pea. Thick with soup.
Deep and sick. The child Catholic in Harriet pleas:
War for Purity!
But her insides yield and lack bitter. Sweet
persimmon. Will she be freed?
Can she shed genes? Her mothers willed
her these, unwilling: your hands, her sticky finale.

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