Thumbelina
I once was a woman who
prayed for just one little baby
someone to love and call my own
I didn’t care if it was
a little boy, a little
girl. but the only baby
that ever came was too
small, too quiet, curled tiny
in my palm. it would not move
it did not cry. morning came
and I
sat by the windowsill, imagining
walnut shell cradles
singing songs of the places
my child would never see.
Holly Day is a housewife and mother of two living in Minneapolis, Minnesota who teaches needlepoint classes in the Minneapolis school district. Her poetry has recently appeared in The Worcester Review, Broken Pencil, and Slipstream, and she is the recipient of the 2011 Sam Ragan Poetry Prize from Barton College. Her most recent published book is “Notenlesen für Dummies Das Pocketbuch,” while her novel, “The Trouble With Clare,” is due out from Hydra Publications in 2013.
Copyright © 2013 by Holly Day