Not a Love Story

- in memory of Corinna

Men and women can't speak
to each other after seeing it.
How long till the anger burns down
and one turns to the other?

My friend is working on another movie -
child prostitution in Vancouver.
Is the right person for such a job
a woman shaking with rage?

Her younger sister died
on a train to Calgary, propped up
like luggage beside her pimp.

My friend says her sister
was the beautiful one, untouchable
as a white star.

I am stirring the soup.
There is nothing left for me to do.
I have painted myself into a warm
bright corner where my children
are well-fed and smiling.

She tells me at which theatre
it is playing, at what time,
that every woman should see it.
But I have refined the cowardly art
of editing my life.

I have heard enough stories
to know they are not all about love.

- Patricia Young

From The Mad and Beautiful Mothers by Patricia Young. Ragweed Press. Used by permission.