Helpless

Ellen Roberts Young

The hamster’s wheel and food
end up in the dumpster.
The child loses his faith.
A god who doesn’t listen

is useless as a parent
who can’t restore his pet
to health the way she mended
his torn teddy bear.

As once I came upon a stranded
baby seal, watched, unable to lift it
to the water, stood whispering
“Keep on, you can do it,”

I could not hug away my son’s
grief, could not offer a heaven
to stanch his loss, could not
amend the order of nature.

 
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Ellen Roberts Young is a member of the writing community in Las Cruces, New Mexico. She has published two chapbooks with Finishing Line Press, Accidents (2004) and The Map of Longing (2009).  Her first full-length book of poetry is Made and Remade, (WordTech Editions, 2014).  She is co-editor of Sin Fronteras/Writers Without Borders Journal and blogs intermittently at www.freethoughtandmetaphor.com.