A Tweet Reads, “The Smallest Caskets are the Heaviest”
— Peshawar, Pakistan
I saw the cement walls
pocked with bullet holes.
The shoe left in a black clot
smeared with a darker
red. The blood you shed.
In photos where you carry
the bodies of children from
a school, your expressions
are stricken, but I have to
pin this on the breast
of your unfairer sex. So
you heft small caskets
above your head. But let’s
admit the lasting burden
rests on the shoulders
of mothers. Photos show
their features blurred by veils
cut from the cloth of grief.
Sonia Greenfield was born and raised in Peekskill, New York. Her poems, essays, and fiction have appeared widely, including in 2010 Best American Poetry, The Bellevue Literary Review, Cimarron Review, The Massachusetts Review, and Rattle. Her book, Boy with a Halo at the Farmer’s Market, won the 2014 Codhill Poetry Prize. She lived with her husband and son in Los Angeles, California, where she taught writing at USC. She currently lives in Minneapolis and teaches at Normandale Community College.
An Ekphrastic Poem originally published on July 1st 2016 in Life and Legends.