You never understood the why
though you were the who, playing
the Christmas doll every girl longed for
under the tree. The teacher took you,
a skinny five-year-old, under her wing,
saying she shared your awkward
left-handedness. And you fit the costume—
a black wool coat with red muff
and beret. To skirt any risk of tumbling
as the float rumbled through the streets,
the farmer strapped you to a cold metal rod
under the towering evergreen.
You hunched against the brutal Kansas winter.
Sharp winds blew across the Plains
and through your bones—your hands thrust
deep into the muff, the hat pinned tightly
to your curls. Only that week, Lee,
the cutest boy in your class, whispered
during nap time that his third-grade brother
was in love with you. The teacher sat
you in the corner for talking.
But as the tractor bounced and lurched,
knowing Lee and his brother were
watching, you only cared about who gets
electrified by a new sensation.
Who is a doll, who is loved.

Sandi Stromberg is the author of the poetry colection Frogs Don’t Sing Red. Her work recently appeared in The Orchards Poetry Journal, Pulse, equinox, Gyroscope Review, Panoply, San Pedro River Review, The Windhover, and The Senior Class. An editor at The Ekphrastic Review as well as of two anthologies of poetry, she’s a four time Pushcart and two-time Best of the Net nominee. Dutch translations of her poems have appeared in Brabant Cultureel.