Day 930

There are days
when what she wishes for
is her doll. The doll
she slept with, the doll
she carried everywhere with her
when she was small, the doll
whose cloth body was mended
and mended again
by her grandmother, the doll
who stayed on a chair
in the corner of her room
while she went to second grade,
third. The doll
she almost forgot about
as soon as she made friends.
As soon as she could read.
As soon as she learned to draw.
The doll who was blown to pieces
when the house was blown to pieces.
When her grandmother
was blown to pieces
and her mother, her father.
Random luck of her being
sent to her aunt’s house
on the day of the bombing
to play with her cousins;
playing all day, then
getting the news
just as her uncle
was going to walk her home.
She thinks of her doll:
stained dress, yarn eyes,
stringy red hair.
Did the doll’s cloth body
scatter in fragments
like her mother’s? Her father’s?