She knocked so many men off her pedestal
That at one point you had to wonder
If she might not need a new carpenter

I was there, three times, the last two
With eyes wide open and a plan to run
For the exits at the first sign of ropes and pulleys

I found her enchanting, at least when she was young;
As a mature woman she developed traits that never left
Her after she turned seventeen.

Not her fault, you understand. Some of us get
Rooted in our best, and hers was a small A-frame house
In Queens surrounded by a white picket fence

Life was simpler then, and beautiful. Her mother
Was a saint and her father was God.
Where it all went wrong was something she ponders to this day.

Pity the young for believing, if only for a moment,
They are to blame for the failures of their parents
Or thinking they put the matches in the hands of arsonists

Broken people can be so exhausting. Broken parents
Are the kind you have to love while furious that
It’s you they always call to repair their shattered crockery

So she fixed her eye on a time when Daddy loved her
And mommy wasn’t a bon vivant. When coming home
Was everything. When people loved her without quarter.

And now she looks for that in men, and for a time
They are hoisted like flags and fly so proudly and so high
Until she sees the flaw in the colors and saws them down.

The third time was a charm, although the saint in me
Still thinks she could be saved. But my joints ache
From falling too often and too far. I am done.

Then last year, someone tore down the white picket fence
And I sometimes wonder if she still rides from Valhalla
With the hammer and nails to build her pedestal again.

01/22/2012

Posted on 01/22/2012
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