Brown floor cloaked. White flour
trail.
A leader.
A small fridge opens its wide mouth, letting me
greet its cold insides.
A rot banana.
Mucky carrots.
Luggage.
They showed up, under the door frame.
Two men drenched in
charcoal. Carrying meddling
Polaroid.
They captured broken glass,
dirt masking success,
frightened eyebrows.
My own eyes flashing back at them.
Flashing a peculiar
father who dragged my luggage
by his ankles.
The key shouldn’t have worked.
The key should have squawked in the door,
at my pink dress,
at my black heels. But, its entrance was
easy, mandatory.
When I got back to picture frames
and silence, I found
my products of life
in boxes
on a neighboring balcony.
My apologies, I said,
you shouldn’t have been bothered.
And they weren’t.
They would not be bothered
with white powdered jelly doughnuts
or
a girl,
with rotten umbilical cord
wrapped around
her neck in her dreams, every night.
maggiemaeijustsaythis 
Oh, luggage and rotten umbilical cords – you are a fascinating writer Maggie
🙂 Thanks Polly!
I like the rotten umbilical cords!! Very well written!!
Violet, thank you!
Good piece
Nick
Thanks Nick 🙂
a girl,
with rotten umbilical cord
wrapped around
her neck in her dreams, every night. GK knows what that means but it has to be important!
I’ll give some insight here.
Umbilical cord is a reference to ties with parents, rotten…meaning not good parents
smothering, strangling….it is basically a reference to feeling the effects of having abusive parents. Does that make sense?
and I mean abusive in any type of abusive sense. Controlling, manipulative, passive-aggressive, physically, emotionally…whatever!
Yes Maggie I do understand and now it makes a great deal of sense. Thank you for being so patient with me ! I have insight I do understand I just think we speak different languages!! The poem is brilliant , the more of your work I read the more I get it! Thank you for sharing!!
Ah! I love that. It’s like learning another language! Awesome! You don’t have to thank me for being patient. You are the patient one. To keep reading when some things you do not understand. You understand in a shared language of feeling 🙂 You mean a ton to me!
That it a shared language ..thanks you mean a ton to me too! Some things you just know are worth working at and nothing good comes easy!!
again the mental pictures of your poetry are incredible.
🙂 Thank you!