Danish Red 10, Scarlet 6: Red-Hot Shoes

[bookblather]

Author: Kat
Title: Red-Hot Shoes
Story: In the Heart
Colors: Danish red 10 (red shoes), scarlet 6 (I'd cut up my heart for you to wear if you wanted it.) with kana's paint-by-numbers (And I think that I told you, I'd wait for you forever/Now I know someone else's holding you,/so, for the first time in my life - I must lie).
Supplies and Materials: Oils (sometimes love just isn't enough), glitter (What would you change about your family life if you could?), feathers (It just goes out with an empty fizz, like a cigarette hitting the bottom of a Coke can. -- Mila Jaroniec), novelty beads (Freedom, well, that's just some people talking. Your prison is walking through this world all alone. - The Eagles, Desperado).
Word Count: 144
Rating: PG.
Summary: What do wicked mothers get?
Warnings: blink-and-miss-it implications of child abuse and child abandonment, fairy-tale violence.
Notes: poetryyyyy. You missed it. None of these views are the author's.



The wicked stepmother dances in red-hot iron shoes
dances herself to death with burning hair
and a shrieking smile
but what do they give wicked mothers?
Nothing
not even the whisper of an eyelash.
Wicked mothers punish themselves.

The dog loves her, at least.
He is bigger than her heart
and her two fists put together
bigger than her children
when they were small.
He puts his large head on her knee
and looks at her with melting eyes
and she feeds him and
he loves her
just like that.

Of course she is not his mother.

She is not their mother either.
They have found new homes
new parents
new families
like her husband did so long ago.
She lost them herself.
She has no one else to blame.

Rebecca walks her dog in the mornings
dancing herself to death
in sensible shoes.

Comments

[isana]

Oh, this is so sad and so matter-of-fact at the same time. At least Rebecca's not entirely alone; she deserves a little solace for at least acknowledging her mistakes.

[bookblather]

And she does have a little solace. She feels as if she's dancing herself to death, but she's really only dancing in limbo.

Thank you!

[finch]

I particularly love the last two lines - "sensible shoes" says so much about her, doesn't it?

[bookblather]

It really does. And thank you, so much.