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111th Weekly Poetry Contest honorable mention: Anna

by Mary Soon Lee

Her mother came from Ethiopia,
my father from Malaysia,
four thousand miles apart
on different continents,
but we both had brown eyes,
brown hair, brownish skin,
so people assumed we were sisters.
We were both picked last,
or next to last,
for sports teams,
both requested to refrain
from joining the school choir,
or that is what I remember now
at sufficient distance
that little is certain to me
as I think about her bedroom,
its small neatness
overlooking the small back garden
where her small tortoise,
called Speedy,
worked his way,
more quickly than you might imagine,
across the lawn.

(First published in The Chariton Review)

111th Weekly Poetry Contest