My Dear, On Sundays

I
expect I am learning too quickly.
My fingers arrange themselves like
chocolate flowers against the wood of the
door; my eyelashes are sweet and tiny, I
print playbills on the skin of my neck.

My dear, on Sundays I am
clean and new, tear-gold coins
bit between my teeth; I am
a dappled mare, guided
by the reins of theory held
in your knuckly hands.

You take me to visit a guru,
pushing my hair out of my eyes
and directing me to curtsey. He says
I am beyond hope,
and when you stride to the window,
he whispers to me,
“Are you sure of
why you're here, my child?”

I shake my head.
I am seldom sure.