Thank you to Editor Nina D'Arcangela of The Sirens Call E-zine for publishing my 2 poems in Issue 41.  A special thank you to Lee Forman for suggesting that one terrific tweak that would really showcase that one word.

Mary Roberts

Mary Roberts, are you alive?

I thought you were twitching.

Living eyes shifting and darting

as you study the room,

but you’re made with skin of plastic,

your traveling cannot be.

You can only stay in one place.

Your eyes in that face cannot see.

Mary Roberts, are you alive?

I’m sure you were twitching.

Showing much more wrist than before,

hands stretched from the gingham,

fingers pulling on the stitching. 

If your arms could rise much further,

just what could those hands do?

What is that lying on the floor?

Mary Roberts, you are alive!

I just watched you twitching.

Feet moving inside pretty shoes,

and those legs, if they moved,

could they possibly be creeping?

Warm liquid now on floorboard seeping.

Now prone, I hear feet being shuffled.

Now prone, I hear breath being muffled.

How did you get from there to here?

Josephine

Kiss Josephine’s cheek

and smooth her hair

so she won’t be afraid.

Yes, Mother.

Now, 

tell her goodbye.

Yes, Mother.

The casket shut.

We drove home.

Josephine, I love you.