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enjoy this Christopher Hivner writing in the Scars Publications free 2016 PDF file chapbook: The Corrosion (click on the front cover image or the title text to download the free PDF file)				You can also order this as a 2016 6" x 9" perfect-bound paperback ISBN# book! Click on the book cover & order The Corrosion as a full color cover book today!

Mama Kisses Daddy

Christopher Hivner

and then the car pulled to the curb,
(just keep driving, please)
the power window lowering
(don’t look at me, pick someone else)
to reveal a well-dressed man
(married, they all are)
in his 50’s, motioning.
(he wants me)
The deal is struck
(guess I eat tonight)
and the car drives to a deserted lot.
(home again, home again, jiggity jig)
Money is exchanged
(if only I got it all)

and then the dream begins
even before she closes her eyes and starts.

Mama stands in the yard
watching daddy pull into the driveway.
Little girl hangs on Mama’s dress.
Thin cotton material
sliding coolly between her tiny fingers,
feeling like the underside of her pillow at night.
Her head falls against Mama’s thigh,
dimming sunlight covering her face like a mask.
Little girl waves to a passing friend
as she is enveloped by Daddy’s shadow.
Daddy kisses Mama,
large, strong hands resting gracefully on her hips.
Little girl stands in the darkness,
collecting the warmth from their bodies,
looking up when her name is spoken
and trying to grow taller
as Daddy’s hand reaches down
to stroke her hair
and brush it like a cat’s whisker over her skin.
The hand slips behind her head

and holds her in place
while she chokes.
(can’t breathe)
The well-dressed man
(go home to your wife)
won’t let go even as she scratches his face.
(draw blood)
Finally he finishes and relaxes
(oh my God, help me)
and makes no move to stop her
(get out get out get out get out)
when she runs from the car

into the nightmare
that dances inside her skull.

Riding in the backseat,
Daddy looking at Mama and smiling.
Mama turning to daddy,
screaming,
and then the crash,
spinning, spinning, spinning.
Little girl’s head cracks the window,
Mama wailing, Daddy gone,
another crash and the car stops.
The air is silent,
wrapping its uncaring arms
around the girl,
descending on her through the roof
that isn’t there anymore.
She listens for Mama and Daddy,
waits for one of them to pick her up.
She calls to them and listens,
shrieks their names, sobbing through the blood,
begs them to hold her,
reaches for Mama’s dress, Daddy’s hand

her apartment door
and falls inside, crumbling to the floor.
Vomiting up the evenings flavors,
searching for tears that can’t come
because the well is dry,
as dead and cold
as the grave she should be buried in
(how did I survive)
with her parents.
(why did I survive)
The little girl curled up on the floor
(want to sleep)
burying her face inside her arms,
creating a cocoon.
(go to sleep, stop thinking)
She tries to love the darkness
(my only lover)
and forget.

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