This Room Is Not My Own
By Julia A., Ft. Washington, PA
I haven't slept in a five-year-old girl's room
since I was a five-year-old girl.
I am a tenant in her parents' house,
a stranger.
We share a love for lavender and butterflies.
They cover the curtains, the bedspread and the walls
but I have a distrust for her baby dolls.
I put them under the bed when I got here.
I don't need their glass eyes, soulless windows.
They are too much like the eyes
of too many people I know.
I cut my leg shaving in her bathtub
and bled into her purple and white towel.
My eyelashes fell out into her sink
and down the drain
before I could make a wish.
A carousel rocking horse by the bed
has a bit in its mouth.
Outside the window, the glitter of the waterfront city
competes with the glitter of the stars.
A white butterfly has fallen in the corner.
One of its wings dust
the maid will sweep tomorrow.
I won't sleep tonight.
I cannot match my dreams to hers.
A siren starts up in the distance,
and rises, cutting the night.
I keep turning her pillow
to find the cool side.
Her bed is too warm and too soft.
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