My Daughter Was Always the Resourceful One by Francesca Bell

In the days of her death wish,
my eyes were fixed, open

my life
a watchtower
I couldn’t stop
looking down from.

She couldn’t be
trusted even to sleep
separately then

though we’d locked up
so many things:

belts that seemed
innocent
before her

the well-meaning medicines
electrical cords
in their tyranny of tangles

her scarves/my scarves

the noose we found
when we searched
her closet

two deluxe Swiss Army knives

a handful of bare blades
she’d extracted
from her plastic razors

all our shoelaces
in a messy, little pile

dental floss, reeking of mint

keys to all four cars

and every pair of scissors
in the house
no matter how small.

I lay beside her
in the dark
to watch, weeping,

while she kept on
breathing
against her will.

I worked so hard
to give her life.

She worked so hard
to hand it back.

From: http://quidditylit.org/issue-11-2/fbell/

Date: 2018

By: Francesca Bell (19??- )