Wax doll
From a surfeit of dark
you’re wax-cold
at the basement window
while through the back
of the house
light filters down
the corridor and
beyond there’s the garden
with banana and bougainvillea
and a child
under the palm leaves
holding out a coconut:
its dark husk smells
of the sea
that washed it into shore.
Take the fruit, crack the shell
– taste the moist flesh!
The sun has flung open
the window and let in its song
and you melt, you melt.
Caroline Maldonado is a poet and translator. Her work has appeared in many magazines, anthologies and online. Four poetry translations from Italian have been published by Smokestack Books. Information on her own poetry can be found in http://www.poetrypf.co.uk/carolinemaldonadobiog.shtml