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ROOTS
the madrigal, volume ii
Forty-Eight Hours
by jacqueline brown
My father always used to say
I weighed a kilo
He didn’t say how I was born as night turned to day with the
Early morning sun rising
Or how quiet I was
My lungs depriving themselves of oxygen while
My brain waged war against me—
A body furiously red
He never told how loud the cries of my mother were
As she wrestled with the thought that her child might leave this earth
Left to dangle between the precipice
Of heaven and hell
I suppose he never had to
The scale
Said everything
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