It means you’re a pedophile,
and every guy from pre-school playdates
to first prom suitors are pedophiles too,
and they will all snatch your daughters as they drive
space shuttle vans across the country. And every
worrisome mother carries weight on arthritic frames
during childbirth like a full body rucksack; six-hour
catnaps and quick McDonald’s trips the legacy of
when this little princess was embryonic, responsible
for extra baggage and more that may never burn away,
despite counted calories and treadmill jogs. At once
these girls tire their leather pendulums. They scamper
towards the playscape, climbing chain ladders, screaming
in jubilation while you remain frozen in a swing seat;
rabbit eyes dart for what you hope won’t be fire in
an angry mother’s eyes and mouth as her grizzly bear neck
reddens with threats. On TV nearby, 5 o’clock suits and smiles
report: a little blond-haired girl, abducted from her home
the next county over. Police release a suspect’s mugshot,
an uncle or a babysitter also missing, and for a week
every woman’s eyes at the playground are on you and
you alone, and it’s not for desperate housewife affairs. They
don’t talk, they gossip. You’d like to clear air, explain you’ve
always enjoyed swings and bright skies as much now as when
you were small; I haven’t changed, everyone else has,
you’ll practice in the mirror. But after four days, they discover
the little girl lifeless in another state; New York Times runs a
cover story on discovery, testimony, trial, and finally justice
as Nancy Grace commentary leaps like fish out of fast-food
television water, while you’re swinging in proximity to anonymous
pre-Disney princesses, a psychic sucker punch from her mother,
a Queen, before your strawman rebuttal has a chance to
blossom like paparazzi around that young, stiffened body.
