Poem for Three Dead Girls of Last Summer

My sweetheart says I can no longer watch the news.

You worry too much. And he is right. My fear is a drilling.

Constant. Bloodthick. That girl in the suitcase,

that wife in the river, that woman in the elevator needed me.

I worry to much, it is my right. My fear is a drilling,

songless bird perched upon my shoulder.

That wife in the river, that woman in the elevator needed me.

But I have three girls of my own, they are mine mine mine

and the songless bird perched upon my shoulder

watches over them, my sweet little Gretels who follow me home,

these three girls who are mine mine mine

gobble up my heart like a hunk of bread. When men

see them, my dear little Gretels, they follow me home.

When there is a knock on the door, I stash my darlings in a cupboard.

They come to gobble up my girls like hunks of bread. Men

line up like ants to take them away, to carry them home.

When there is a knock at my door, I hide my darlings inside a cupboard

like bowls of sugar. When they sleep, I wrap them in kites strings,

line them up like ants so no one can take them and carry them home.

They clutch their dolls and all night long they wish for boys

like bowls of sugar. As they sleep, I hold them like kite strings.

Constant. Bloodthick. That girl in the suitcase,

clutched her doll and all night long wished she'd been a boy.

My sweetheart says I can no longer watch the news.