at age 5

s/he woke up scared in the

early morning, with a notion

that momma thought should’ve

been more complex for him/her

to fear or understand or

at least come to terms with

at such an early moment in

life---

“i’m going to die, mom…i’m

going to die…”

&

s/he kept on repeating it

with precious tears streaming

which carried the innocence of

a child that held an independent

horror, not polluted by the

outside, not tarnished by

the mutual mass myths of

fellow schoolchildren---

momma ran her fingers through

her child’s hair to calm her/him &

with nothing else to say,

confronted with the stark reality of

the subject at hand,

she lied & told the little one,

“don’t worry, because there is a

wonderful place that you go to if

you’ve been good on earth, after

death---it’s called heaven.”