The Mailer Review/Volume 13, 2019/The Child

«	The Mailer Review • Volume 13 Number 1 • 2019	»

Written by
Sal Cetrano

Note: For David Koresh

URL: http://prmlr.us/mr13cet1

The Child

Sal Cetrano

For years I’ve tried to bury
the child in me: that last proud
barber pole I stood in front of
as a boy, the new housing project,
chain-lined walks, blacktop sweat,
poverty just a spelling word.

her hands pathetic wild birds,
a wooden man plods from
the house of his single mind.
At such times, when the cover
is torn off catalog comforts
and nothing grown seems full,

the child sliding head-first
into home, center of a good idea,
dustily rises, clear on the score,
and the words that passed for life
go in one ear and out the other,
a naughty habit never broken.