steering with my small unsteady hands
I've turned the corners of my life
steering into the fall
often
stumbling
and skinning my heart
my heart
often exposed to the fall
and wide open
caught, too, in the dampness
like the well-read used book
left spine up on a dewy
out all night Spring morning
my pages bent backwards
knowing that the spine
(where my heart lives...)
might bend too far
and my pages
might unravel and break apart
and when dancing
that same heart dared to wear
see-through dresses
hoping that my invisibility
might be seen
my waif-like tenderness
hidden somewhere beneath two
shelf-like breasts
my navy blue eyes and smile
and a ruffling skirt rising high over my knees
my pulse matching the pulse
of the music
it was
it is
a freedom to live in my own
made-up places
for I belong to me
looking backwards
I'd like to snare an older piece of myself
with my butterfly net
being careful not to snap my wings
I'm not yet an old-woman
with broken legs
but a girl always leaning forward
looking for a breeze
LEGAL COPYRIGHT FRO THIS POEM/JANUARY 22, 2022 8:08 AM PACIFIC STANDARD TIME
TIME AND DATE STAMPED/ AND ALSO FOR THIS WRITER/POET
MELISSA A. HOWELLS AND ALSO FOR THIS LEGALLY COPYRIGHTED AND
REGISTERED SITE TITLE MELOO STRAIGHT FROM HER TILT-A-WORLD
NEARLY FULLY FORMED WHILST DOING THE FOREVER PILE OF LAUNDRY
YESTERDAY AND FOLDED, THE POEM NEW AND UNWRINKLED ONTO THE PAGE TODAY...1/22/2022
