Like the witch in a fairy tale,
she opened the kitchen door
and shoved her small son and daughter
out on the back stoop.
The lock sprang shut behind them.
She turned and walked away
deep inside the house.
It was a chill winter dusk,
the cobalt blue sky
unstained by any cloud.
Limbs and fingers of trees
twisted across it.
In a swamp of rage and fear,
the boy punched his fist
through the glass
and opened the kitchen door,
saving himself and his sister
from the cuttlefish dark.
Confused, angry, loving,
amid the noise and crying
she took the by to the sink
and teased needles of glass
from his hand.
The blood on that white door
is a sign on his doorpost still,
and the chill of that clear sky
a sliver in his heart.
Mark Perlberg 1929 ~ 2008
The Impossible Toystore: Poems, copyright Louisiana State University Press (September 2000)
