The winter my father died a girl I knew
lit her hair on fire, hoping the moths would return
to the elm towering outside her window
and stream in towards her crown of flames.
 
I can’t beautify what escaped back out.
She’s been appearing at my doorstep, her fists
hushed in their mittens, and the frozen milk bottle
across the yellow linoleum of my kitchen, weeping,
while I spin like a horse before the switch is flipped.
 
The fat of my solitude slices thick off the bone.
And in a window across the street, the television’s blue light
does not dark. The girl stands on the porch, hungry,
lost until I let her in.