Barbara Phillips
Break Point
A pretty child she was with her brown bouncing curls,
eyes as clear and blue as the September sky
above the children's hospital with corridors of many
comings and goings by parents with offspring clutching
blankets, teddy bears, lollipops, bottles, dolls, baseball
caps
The fuzzy bear under her arm leaned precariously
towards the floor, googly eyes spun to focus on dimensions
somewhere beyond comprehension, south of reason,
west of sunset as she half skipped and ran to keep up with her
father
who pulled her along in a coat flapping rush towards the exit.
But I don't want to die Daddy, I don't want to.
Daddy I don't want to die. I don't. I don't.
Well you're going to anyway, he said.
He opened the door to the street while she kept calling out
as she followed him, down the subway stairs and the traffic
played itself out in the windwired afternoon, beneath glass
glazed towers that stared at the dances of linden and honey
locust branches, shivering under sun- sunk shadows.
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