honey and sting

The Little Matchgirl, Revisited

I don't like to see her, barefoot in the snow, standing in the alley, looking at the Christmas feast through the window, rubbing her hands for warmth; I like to see her going to the door, and knocking. Like a child at the Inn, I like to see her asking to enter; on this most appropriate day, I like see her appropriating.  And I like to see them, taking her in, as the center of their feast, the reason. I like to see them placing lambswool slippers on her feet and piping goose on her plate, steamed pudding and later, snuggling her into a quilt-warm bed. I like to see her staying on, growing up, fed full of love and feasts. And building a home someday for matchgirls like herself or fighting the laws that create matchgirls.

Or, if they sent her away, said no, and slammed the door shut, and she had no choice but the choice she had, that is, to light all her unsold matches for one last moment of warmth, I don't like to see her frozen dead the next dawn. I like to see her taking those matches and lighting all of those houses, each one that said no, each one that locked her out, and the building where the laws were made and the houses where the law-makers lived, until everyone was burning, burning as she burned in the cold white dark.

                      © Pesha Joyce Gertler