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Sport 41: 2013
Sugar Magnolia Wilson — Glamour
Sugar Magnolia Wilson
Glamour
I have seen some put soft materials—leaves
ferns and vine tendrils for no one. Some placed sticks
around loose foundations like a bracken crown
and built little roofs that sagged but
didn’t let the rain in.
Others had pomegranate seeds littered
across the dust and others still,
flints of yellowing bone.
Often they waited days, filled their time
collecting shells, leaves, flowers, feathers,
seeds, stones and berries. Discarded pegs, caps,
coins, bullets, clips, pins and glass.
There was a lot of lonely dancing.
Others collected sounds instead—imitated the
local pig, waterfalls and chatter, ran round clowning,
hooting like self-assured owls.
But, sometimes nothing works.
Finally, sick of the endless effort
some of them gave up on waiting
and pulled unwilling girls
right out of the sky, took them home.
page 239
One girl tasted the walls with her
triangular tongue—the cheap taste of
ditch-water and decaying twigs—
resigned herself to her fate.
Another stared at her own reflection in the
wall of beetle’s backs, felt a hunger for
something she’d never have.