Missing

 

Star Dancer (On Stage)

—Painting by Edgar Degas

—Poetry by Nolcha Fox, Buffalo, WY

—Photos Courtesy of Public Domain

BALLERINA, MISSING A LEG

You hung in my bedroom
until I left home.
You danced on the stage
on one foot, alone.
Parts of dancers
peeked out behind you.
They didn’t look at you.
You didn’t look at them.
You didn’t look at me.
Was it because I was
underneath you?
I wasn’t one of the pretty ones.
I couldn’t dance on air.
You looked up at the ceiling.
But I never saw anything there.

When I left home,
I never saw you again.
Where did you go?
Did you dance off-stage?
Did you ever find
your missing leg?

 

 

 

 

 

WHERE DO MISSING SOCKS GO?

I know I put a pair of socks
on the kitchen table.
But now they’re gone
(so is my hat).
What’s a girl to do?

First, I look inside my shoes
(not the ones I’m wearing)
No socks there, but
they hold mittens
that I lost last week.

I check the dryer, isn’t that
what eats most missing socks?
No luck there,
and so I check
the purse that I’d been carrying.

In my purse, I find no socks
but there’s my bathing cap.
The dog is looking guilty,
yup, she’s sitting
on the socks.

But my hat is still missing,
and now I can’t find my keys.

 

 

 

 

 

THE PARK

Bare feet broiled
by simmering
summer sidewalks
skipped me to
the park.
The me of
not-child,
not-teen,
freely roaming
sun-kissed
changeling.
Shielding,
shimmering
leafy canopy,
green blades
cool between
my toes.
Swinging high
to kick the future,
pouring sand
upon the past.
In the moment,
hiding from
uncertainty
and fear.

 

 

 

 

 

YOU

are a midnight black sky,
a seeping wound,
your eyes windows of despair,
shuttered to all hope,
your breath a trail of smoke
you follow to the plastic
bag over your head,
to the last exit
of your deserted road.

 

 

 

 

 

THAT WOMAN

That woman is a mystery,
a water-damaged postcard
floating on Atlantic Ocean waves.
She comes to me with postage due.

That woman whispers secrets.
She is the blue china
doorknob to a door
that can’t quite shut.

That woman is the secret twin,
hiding in the high school gym.
She waits for me
to take her to the prom.

That woman is a red lace shawl,
a promise of midnight delight,
but in her pattern
I can find no warmth.

 

 

 

 

 

LOOK OUT, WORLD

I’m old now,
I no longer care
what everybody thinks.

I wear jewels
from carnivals,
fuzzy socks and boots.

Feather boas,
pink or lime,
hats with nets and flowers.

Mink coats
in the summer,
on top of my pajamas.

I’ll show you all
how odd I am.

But I’ll have to
leave the house.

 

 

 

 

 

Today’s LittleNip:

DON’T
—Nolcha Fox

touch the horn,
It’s antique
like me
and it can break.
If you really
want to hear
the music,
pay full price

_________________

Thank you to Nolcha Fox for her intriguing poetry today! Three of her poems are based on our most recent Seed of the Week, Sanctuary. About these poems, Nolcha says, “When I was a child, I found sanctuary in ‘The Park;’ ’You’ is about my baby brother, who killed himself over 20 years ago. (This is the wrong kind of sanctuary). And finding sanctuary in a person isn't always a good idea, as in ‘That Woman’.”

_________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

 

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