Top Shelf 

by Martha Ellen 


Children kept in shoeboxes
on the most remote closet shelf
to be taken down
and paraded before others
as proofs of love and care
and then returned to storage
when no longer needed.
In storage they practice their smiles. 


* * * * *

Martha Ellen lives alone in an old Victorian house on a hill on the Oregon coast. Born and reared in Chicago. Retired social worker. History of social justice activism. Old hippie. MFA. Poems and prose published in various journals and online forums including North Coast Squid, RAIN, Words Have Wings and others. She writes to process her wild life.