cicada shells Madeline Ragsdale it was the summer of screaming and little bodies piled up in the streets or the outlines of bodies, or sleeves, shed in the name of growth how delicate they crunched under little children’s little shoes trudging through gutters lined with the refuse of reincarnation, still perfectly curled in fetal position, eyes empty, abdomen, clinging claws and you plucked them up ecstatic brought them home to your mother, who shuddered in her green kitchen but let you keep them anyway it wasn’t the summer she was dying and I think the cats still lived or maybe your father dug a hole in the backyard while you cried in confusion and pet dead flesh the air was sugary light on skin, you wore it over baggy t-shirts, over baggy shorts over early bleeding, over newly feathered legs and they called you a tomboy, despite all your hair at the doctor’s office shoeless back pressed against the wall the nurse said you’d never grow taller: god made you this way at those words your body wrapped tight around you, all hope of metamorphosis lost this is where I leave you, my uneasy exoskeleton of baby fat
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