Читать книгу The Red Files - Lisa Bird-Wilson - Страница 12

Girl with the Short Hair

if I wanted to describe the girl to you in a poem I might say the short-haired one but they’ve all got short hair and she’s more than that anyway not just a part of the girls’ class making yet another snowman or in dry summer hanging out near the single tire swing looking bored with something clutched in front of her smock, one hand holding it while the other hand plucks at whatever it is, grass or a flower she’s not only a part of this but a “break away,” an individual she has a name but history hasn’t recorded it the curly-haired girl then? surely there must be something better but really they’re all so uniform in their black and white photos oversized winter coats sloppy cotton self-sewn dresses and smocks

more like the one with the easy stance left shoulder dropped carelessly as if in this restless time of year she might turn at any moment and run—but it’s not what you think, it’s not to run away from the school like the others but because it’s in her bones to lope under the prairie sky to slap her feet down on the long grasses and across the short weeds that stretch endlessly for miles in all directions now this is more like it there she is, the breathless one the one with the wind-knotted hair