Sarah Jane

Only children have time to count the steps From one house to another They think in simple terms: Janies house is sixty steps away If I take steps like a giant- Or one hundred steps away if I walk like A little bent over Japanese lady, Walking with tiny bandaged feet The simple truth was that Janie Was over-developed for her age, And she rode a saddle proudly And her house always reeked of old dishwater With a greasy undercurrent of spaghetti sauce And she could be anywhere by now, or nowhere. One night I dreamed she had died, somewhere far away In her homeostatic life, safe from her indistinguishing past She reminded me of one of those pop up targets at carnivals: Bigger and more colorful, than the things around her Her most outstanding feature Her crush, on an invisible boy in Albuquerque She plotted and schemed for months how to visit him- It perplexed me, because I thought he was her cousin Maybe she finally succeeded, vanishing from the Local phone book forever Perhaps to tack a 'Mrs' before her new last name Or maybe to become disenchanted with men forever? And there's no prize left to be won now, Not even in scraped together dishpan reminisces. And nothings more clear now than it was then As I remember how she'd leave, Retrace the few steps back to her front porch If I wouldn't agree to her particular plan For killing a summers day: I can still see her figure, as she slowly made her way, Walking stiffly up the garden path While I kicked myself for being so stupid Surprised all over once more That she'd really do it again.