She draws pretty things,
as girls her age often do—
a pastel-blue cloud dog
with floppy ears and long lashes,
starry eyes shedding pink-tinged tears
that fall like diamonds,
carve rivers through fur,
and crash like asteroids
near the bottom of the page,
where they swell into turquoise pools
that ripple, reach outward
as children cannonball
from rope-swings
tied to ancient cypress,
fleeing the thick weight of summer,
the stories of distant wars,
and the not-so-distant stories
of classrooms split by gunfire,
whispered to teachers and friends
in elementary school,
as they practice their monthly drills—
run, hide, fight—
to prepare for violence
that should be unthinkable,
woven into their days, a failure
not of their making,
but of ours—
our generation,
and the generations before,
who failed our collective duty
to guard the fragile kingdom
of childhood.
An earlier version of this poem was published at Spillwords Press on February 12th, 2024.
The Truth About Tigers 