looking for some one to play with,
will take me away from you! 
Wind with no one to play with
cooees the orange-trees—­
stay-at-home orange trees,
have to nurse oranges,
greeny-gold. 
Wind shouts to the grass—­
run-away-grass
tugs at its roots,
but the earth holds tight
and the grass falls down
and wind boos over it. 
Wind whistles the bees—­
bees too busy
with taking home stuff out of flowers
won’t look back—­
bees always going somewhere. 
Only Jude and I—­
heads over shoulders
watching all roads at one time—­
run with the wind,
going to nowhere.

     :  : 

Jude and I were weeding our garden when we heard his whip—­ must have been a new whip to cut off dandelion-heads at one swing....  He was the kind of boy you knew when you had Celia.... with nice clothes on and curls crawling about his collar like little golden slugs, and his man was leading his horse.  I wish I hadn’t run to meet him....  If you hadn’t run to meet him he mightn’t have trod on your garden and said:  Get out of my field you dirty little beggar... he mightn’t have struck you with his whip....  How the daisies stared....  I hate daisies—­ stupid white faces—­ skinny necks craning over the grass!  I said It is not your field, and he struck me again.  But he didn’t make me run.  His hand smelled of sweet soap... he couldn’t shake me off, but his man did....  Funny—­how the sky fell down and turned over and over like a blue carpet rolling you up, and the grass caught at your face—­ it couldn’t have been spiteful—­ it must have been saving itself.  Hot road... silly wind playing with your hair....  The road smelled of horses.  I only got up when I heard a dray.

     :  : 

Mama has sung ba ba black sheep,
and put a chair with a cloth on it
between me and the light. 
But the clock keeps saying: 
Dirty little beggar,
dirty little beggar.... 
Some day
I will get that boy. 
I will pull off his arms and legs
and put him in a box
and hide the box
under the bed.... 
I wonder
will he buzz
when I take him out to look at his body
that will have no arms to whip me?

Mama drew my cot to the window
so I can look at the stars. 
I will not look at the stars. 
There is a black chimney
throwing up sparks
and one tall flame
like gold hair in a blaze.... 
I know now
what I shall do.... 
I will set fire to him
and he will burn up into a tall flame—­
he will scream into the sky
and sparks will fly out of him—­
he will burn and burn...
and his blazing hair
shall light up the world.

     :  : 

Before he hit me—­
I knew he was going to—­
I thought about Jude.... 
I thought if he’d fight...
but he shriveled all up...
he lay down like a fear.