babyhead

assuming

the motion of an autumn leaf. I smile, and she smiles right on back.

I ask, "Do you like me?"

She nods.

I ask, "We are friends?"

I say, "Friends. You are a friend of mine?"

There are freckles that turn to the right, eyes that look away,

and then move right back to mine.

"Yes...we're friends.", she says.

"Then why," I ask, "do you not sprinkle cyanide in my box of Frosted Mini-Wheats?"

"Why is it that you do not smother me in my sleep?" I ask.

"I know you have had ample opportunity to leave objects precariously on the stairs in the dark, and yet, you haven't." I mention.

I ask her, "Why is that you let me go back, every morning, to that place?"

"You want cyanide in your coffee?"

"You want to talk?"

"Cereal. In the cereal, dear, put it in my cereal."