Don't Call Her Punkin

Don't Call Her Punkin They say this world's not a little girl anymore. She's grown into her pearls— Cairo, Tokyo, Chicago— and she wears them everywhere now. You can't stand on a mountain and tell me you see her there, snuggled under her crazy quilt with hair ribbons straggling like the road home. That's not a lullaby you hear, it's a mockingbird. You can't lift a hand to the sky past sunset these days and touch the blue velour dress she wore for best, the one she used to doodle on with a wet finger in church, the one that caught the air when she spun and turned her scrawny knees into a clapper so she rang even louder than summer rain. That dress was cut into rags years ago and the rags used up. I don't know what she wears to church now, or if she even goes. -Mary Silver 103 ...