CountDown
Une Femme
Sierra snatches
a broken black crayon
and draws a circle
on crisp white paper.
She tilts her head
toward the awkward
curvature;
curls her dark eyes
on me while
her left hand spins
in and pins an eye
like the hand of
a record player.
She throws in the
hard black pupil then
draws a second,
much bigger eye.
Then an arched line
swept cheek
to cheek.
No nose.
Two lines from the head;
two legs from the chin.
She fixes them as a matter
of formality, with the quick
punctuation of a last minute
post-it note left
on the refrigerator.
Sierra beams, sweeping
back the plastic green chair,
clutches the corner of the
paper and says,
"Look mama, it's a girl."
It doesn't matter
who she is, this
dilapidated creature
squinting like a salty
old man over the
stern of his ship.
It doesn't matter
because she
is smiling.
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