SELLING LIGHT
m a r y   e l i z a b e t h   p a r k e r

Lighting matches to keep warm,
the matchgirl caught fire.
Now her bones glow like streetlamps.

Their gleam will flesh out in your memory:
her streetcorner frescoed in light,
her face in broken water in the street.

Stripped clean in the light, her love
is a shoplifter's coat, revealing
a bowl of milk, a gilt spoon.

In the ark of her bones, matches
flicker with an uneasy heat.
Don't look down from her face

or scrape in your pocket for change --
when this moment is gone she'll have to take back
her flesh.

From The Sex Girl, © 1999 ~ publisher Urthona Press, Asheville, NC

margin home | contents | links | reading list | marginalia | contributors | staff | guidelines | kudos | subscriptions | contact us

Layout, design & revisions ©1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 Tamara Kaye Sellman, Webmaster
Active home URL: http://www.magical-realism.com
(also: https://www.angelfire.com/wa2/margin/index. html)

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

TERMS OF USE: This site contains copyrighted materials, including but not limited to text and graphics. You may not use, copy, publish, upload, download, post to a bulletin board, include in any weblog or otherwise transmit, distribute or modify any elements of this site in any way, except that you may download one copy of such contents on any single computer for your own personal, non-commercial use, provided you do not alter or remove any copyright, author attribution or other proprietary notices.

Rev'd 2003/04/06