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Coddle

Frankie McMillan


Mornings we swallowed
castor oil, wore white

padded corsets with rubber buttons
to startle the winter, sat in deck

chairs to sun our limbs, none
of us held the lever that would

reverse our days, and though we
rubbed our feet with pumice

sloughed away the thoughts
of certain sounds, matron whistling,

the bellows of the iron lung,
we grew no wiser, our health

blew in gusts through rafters
up through our clavicles,

the rattle of breakfast
trays we drew breath

opened our throats to the sea

 


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