little girl, little girl
3.12.08

she presses a kiss to my nose
velvet lips against my skin
firework-bright smile in glistening eyes
Love ya, Daddy.
and she turns over in bed, snuggling beneath
a precious, perfect, princess quilt
and closes eyelids like a curtain draped across
the blue, blue sky
'night, babydoll.
((silence)) echoes up from her blissful dreams

morning stretches over the horizon
before she bounds out to play,
I steal from her a feather light kiss, a shy whisper:
Love ya, Daddy.
then, she scampers out the door

and there she goes, dancing like a butterfly
look at me; I'm a flutterby!
twirling magically along (a fairy)
in the streets (of her precious, perfect, princess kingdom)
picking flowers with poetic fingers

and suddenly, she's thrust back to reality
(where streets aren't filled with daisies
but with cars instead)
headlights blind her with an ethereal glow
a horn, like a bullet, rents the (blue, blue) sky
a shriek -- a heart-stopping, blood-curdling,
nails-on-a-blackboard shriek -- and then...
((utter silence))

and the precious, perfect, princess words
echo in the stillness that is now her empty bedroom
Love ya, Daddy.

---

author's note: inspired by a quote in a story I read on fanfiction. Anyone who is interested in the TV show Charmed should definitely check out this story -- by the author Zeria. The story is called New Beginnings. Anyway, this was the quote:

Bethy kissed his nose. "Love you, Marsh."

That quote ran around my mind all day until finally, mid-afternoon, I just had to let it out and write a poem about it. This is the result. Please let me know what y'all think... and also if anyone has any suggestions for a real title...