Limp-bodied child


She picked him up
that limp-bodied child
with sores on his legs
like tattooed roses
Held him while milk warmed
hoped for a smile
Eyes sunken in fragile sockets
he watched the pan on the burner
not her face
His limbs flopped
oversized head wobbled
He waited with patience
no hope of rescue



Trouble Caked in Sugar


The sound of her saccharine voice
for the first time in ten years
brings the hair on the back
of my neck to full attention.

She chats and chuckles,
relates a long-winded tale
until I almost snap
with impatience.

Dread digs claws in my mind.
I ask, What can I do for you?

As suspected, she wants a favor,
a paper buried
in a box in the attic,
to help her hang a trumped-up infamy
on some poor man’s shoulders.

I feel the smile on my face
transmit over the phone
as I say,
No.



Patricia Wellingham-Jones has a longtime interest in 'healing writing' and the benefits people gain from writing and reading their work together. Widely published, her chapbooks include Don’t Turn Away: Poems About Breast Cancer, Voices on the Land, and End-Cycle, poems about caregiving.