Saul Bennett
Please Grant Mercy, Ella Webb!
Sealed within a windowed tube that struck me
as a giant chrome-and-ivory jumping bean,
inside a tent lit up like the baseball
Polo Grounds a ways uptown,
in a silent foreign corner
past the whip and ferris wheel,
on the noisy festive sprawling
floor of the ancient armory,
the girl my age smiled
thin as balsa toy wood through me to her end.
ELLA WEBB ! THE GIRL IN AN IRON LUNG!
PLEASE HELP ELLA IN HER FIGHT WITH
YOUR GENEROUS DONATION!
Too scared to drift too near I watched
from where I brushed those words
dark hair surround her
aging newsprint yellow cheeks,
feeling after guilt with
every easy breathing stride.
Maybe we gave a quarter.