I tried to cut her carrot-colored hair into a pixie.
Split her gold headband in two
that I thought could fit on Crissy
who had a cool mane that grew from a hole
in her scalp when I pressed a button on her tummy.

Magic markered Skipper’s eyes.
Hated that she glanced to the left.
                        Wanted them perfectly centered.
Wanted everything back the way it was before.

Mom said,  Some things can’t be fixed.
And this was a blow I did not accept so I scotch taped her back together
along with a leg I took off                  when I couldn’t make her                     bend.
Convinced myself it was all good as                        new.

I found              Skipper’s tan leg                in the basement today.

                                                                                                      I can’t find the rest of her
or Crissy—                               I think I broke her too.

Mom has been gone four years.

Saved my innocence in six plastic bins that I can’t seem to sort.
I have thirty-two pristine Madame Alexander dolls wrapped in pink tissue
in their original blue cardboard homes stacked on top of
a few Holiday Barbies still in their packages-- I wonder where 1983-1988 went. 

The dream house is gone but I still have the camper
and a tiny white brush and comb.

Victoria Nordlund's poetry collection Wine-Dark Sea was published by Main Street Rag in 2020. She is a Best of the Net and Pushcart Prize Nominee, whose work has appeared in PANK Magazine, Rust+Moth, Chestnut Review, Pidgeonholes, Maudlin House, and elsewhere. Visit her at VictoriaNordlund.com