Nineteen (by Kathy Young Wonderling)

Her daughter runs through buttercups
Brown eyes alight with laughter.
She still believes in fairy tales
In happy-ever-after.

She once believed in fairy tales
In happy-ever-after
Until she knew the wolf’s sharp teeth
The witches’ mocking laughter.

So sweetly had the sirens sung
Of pleasure to be tasted.
Her body gaunt, strawberry-veined
Relentlessly she chased it.

The hoarded pills wait on the shelf,
Two hot cocoas laced with sleep.
Then cradling her four-year-old,
She’ll beg, “Our souls to keep.”