Got It Good

[Aish]

When spring came that year, we joined hands
in a ring-a-rosy dervish; I
giggling, you wondering how.
I only notice now, from your Kodak blush,
that the push of the crowd made you cower
as you thrust your pigtailed prettiness before you:
gold, like Maccabee’s shield.

We played pat-a-cake in the summer,
cross-legged on concrete like beggars.
You envied me my knees
free of daubed mercurochrome;
my home, too poor for even a coat of dust,
but just a pocket full of seeds,
not a coffin of secrets.

I saw you flinch and twist
as your wrist cracked under his hand.
Leaves fell without pause
and you did not break their silence,
nor I.

The autumn and I awoke
to you: broken in the first snow,
golden eagles spread saintly
about your head.

Oh, this is poignant and beautiful. "Kodak blush" is clever! I love "gold, like Maccabees shield", interesting apocryphal image of heroes battling tyranny. Your choices are adept, I can see the little girls and feel the pain of abusive secrets. The monkeyblood on scraped knees is quite clever, too, it is so concrete and anchors in the crystallization of childhood.

The weaving of seasons is interesting to me, as it hints at aging as well as climate changes." The autumn and I awoke
to you: broken in the first snow,
golden eagles spread saintly
about your head." Are the golden eagles a reference to the struggle between good and evil? It gave me the impression your friend was killed by her abuser.