Ricky ~anna hood~

Over her head he sleeps
curled away in the straight-jacket
of his mind
his body thrashing
dreams.

Does he dream that someone
loves him? No one does (do they?)
except Daisy
the black and white collie
whose whole body shivers
with love for him.

She tries really she does,
what mother
wouldn't/couldn’t love her child?
(God help her)

The children, even the kind
ones call him moron
spaz lunatic. She tells people
something misfires in his brain
crashes smashes mashes trashes
in his brain my GOD
she's beginning to sound like him.

She tries to love him. Really.
Where did she go wrong?
She did everything right
the vitamins
the exercises, no alcohol
not even a drop on her birthday
sat for hours at the old Heinzman
in the porch playing Gershwin for him
(Someone To Watch Over Me)
read to him
(Beatrix Potter and such)
when he was just a slippery
fish even then thrashing
kicking lurching around inside her.

At night when he sleeps she reads
the National Enquirer mostly
and wonders about aliens.