Little Girl

Oh, little girl, I have not seen your face
for 50 years, all photographs being
lost in the family firestorm.
Then this primary school snapshot
is sent to me by my oldest friend.
I struggle to find my 6-years-old self
like a stranger in a crowd.
 
Oh, little girl, your face is a magic-eye picture
of both mother and father’s features.
I smile at my original hair colour
long since corrupted by hairdressers,
kept boyishly short then by mum
for convenience, which at 60
I still wear at shoulder’s length.
 
Oh, little girl, here you have exchanged
the pinch and punch of the village school
for the hand offered with a beam — Come and play.
And I am impotent as a post-diction clairvoyant
to warn you, that soon life will wipe that
smile off your face, and then you must do
the only thing you can little girl, be patient –

Fiona Sinclair

If you have any thoughts on this poem,  Fiona Sinclair  would be pleased to hear them.