The short story of an American girl

by Mara Buck


I dream that she is my daughter.
I shake her and shake her and she will not rise.
Wake up darling. I have written a poem.
I have painted a picture. I have put forth a theory.
Yet she does not rise.
There is no magic—
only tears and spent cartridge casings
on the schoolroom floor.

Your daughter goes out one day, springtime-excited,
jazzed for the future, your baby, your own.
So alive that the air sparkles around her.
So innocent that Disney bluebirds encircle her head.
She laughs, See you later… but she never does.
Small metal fragments pierce her precious holy skin,
and you cannot protect her.
For your daughter goes out one day,
and you relive that moment,
a road to be worn thin with the traveling years from now.
And they, they may tell the story,
but for you it will not matter—
because for you it will always remain,
one Tuesday morning in May.

In the United States there have been many school shootings. May 23, 2022 nineteen schoolchildren were murdered in Texas. The ripples of such grief are profound.

* * * * *


Mara Buck writes, paints, and rants in a self-constructed hideaway in the Maine woods. Finalist for the Gravity Award, recently short-listed for the Alpine Fellowship. Winner of The Raven Prize, Scottish Arts Club Short Story Prize, the Moon Prize, F. Scott Fitzgerald Prize, Binnacle International Prize and others, with works in numerous literary magazines and print anthologies. The ubiquitous novel lurks.