//creative//
Spring 2020

October 2010
Willa Neubauer

Dyed red, maraschino cherry jar label red, with 
one white streak. She eats ham and 
rice pudding. She smells like ham and rice pudding, sometimes,
other times like the bottoms of drawers. I say, 
let's get up and face the day. She likes walking, she bends like 
folding paper, she has sharp limbs, she has
very high eyebrows. We watch the time 
from the kitchen window and hear motorcycles, eat ham 
and rice pudding, drink Orangina, feed the cats. 
She knows: where stamps go on envelopes,  
Latin bird names, what to wear in the rain. 
When she sees me she touches me, says, I know you?
I say, let's get up and face the day.
She likes walking, she bends like folding paper, she 
leads me through the hallway and the doorway and beneath
the yellow porch light. Her body blows over pavement,
our red hair gathers rain.


//Willa Neubauer is sophmore at Barnard College. She can be reached at wmn2106@barnard.edu.