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Child Bride Women rise to the star loft.Women wait at the back door, set platters before you, bread and meat. Another woman washes. It’s different every night.Your sister has two days before her wedding, but she has been sewing since she was five. Your cousin is nineteen, but her groom is sixty.You risk salvation by squeezing your eyes. Now your prophet is wheat in a rain field. Now your prophet is acid and orange. Love ends in the pocket, a rope belt untying.The threads fissure like hair in the hand. What is your name and who is your mother? The halls are full of girls. You get used to fingers.The boys are lost—leave them. Leave behind your nineteen mothers. Your father will never remember your name. -9- ...

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