little girl crouching on the front stoop.
looks of concern cross my face
and disappear, a storm front--
unnoticed by her.
little girl with raven hair is sopping wet,
and bitterly cold. her dark locks
hanging in strands from the sprinkler's showers
that her friends are playing in, and
exposing her frigid feelings to the world;
she ignores me contemptuously.
little girl wrapped snugly in a towel
rocking back and forth to her own beat,
humming a tune i can't quite trace,
but strangely familiar to my ears.
she's in her own private world,
and refuses to allow me inside it.
little girl crying on the front stoop.
I walk away.