Miss Alford Walks
A dressmaker stands tall
on a shortened leg,
vaulted traction
under her corset’s sheath.
One hip once swung
out of socket,
leaving one limb
as an underdeveloped casualty.
Yes, a surgical artist
fitted Miss Alford,
J. Gillingham’s leather harness
strapped to her Victorian skin
like the Earth’s shadow
pasted across our neighbor,
a celestial slap in the face
over her ruler’s length of rubber
dropping onto a cobblestone affair
curving into the gas-lit stares
leaking from onlookers’ eyes.
The moon’s white teeth
roars back into view,
screaming out that ghastly light
along an intersection
of upward mobility.
Copyright © Keith Gaboury 2016
I earned an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College in 2013. i currently live in Cambridge, Massachusetts as an early childhood educator.
