by LaDonna Witmer

I deserve to live
said the girl.

The bomb is falling
from such a height
it could be a seed
blown from a dandelion
surfing the stratosphere.

I am just a girl said the girl
I have barely begun to live
and I’d very much like
to keep doing it.

Everyone wants to keep living
said the bomb but what have you
done to deserve it? Convince me
you’re worthy
and maybe
I’ll fall somewhere else.

The bomb is nearer now
olive shaped and
heartless as gravity.
I don’t want you to fall

somewhere else said the girl
you could crush my cousins
my neighbors the hospital
the school.

Oh says the bomb. It is a fist now.
Would you rather I turn back
and fall upon your enemies?

No said the girl No
I do not wish you to fall
upon anyone anywhere at all.
Can’t you turn into a cloud?

The bomb is quite close and suddenly
so much bigger. You could say
it’s the size of a girl.

Ah says the bomb I see now
you are guiltless and kind and clearly
you deserve to live but
the problem is

you were born
in the wrong place
at the wrong time
and I cannot stop falling
for you.

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LaDonna Witmer is writing for herself after a couple of decades spent writing for other people (journalist, copywriter, editorial director). She has a poem forthcoming in a 2024 anthology from Flipped Mitten Press. Back in her slam poetry youth, she published three chapbooks and had a handful of poems printed in various zines. She writes prose at wordsbyladonna.substack.com and is 2/5 of the way through writing a memoir about her fundamentalist upbringing.