Austin Wallace

CRIPPLED CHILD IN COSTUME (Version 1)*

Listen to Audio Version read by Jill Khoury.

Born deformed
to give doctors
something to fix
again, then once again
they mummify my defects
but what emerges
frightens other children
turns parents to stone

For me every day
is spent in a display
window, watching others glance
at me, politely turn
away, while I grin
to show I'm not offended,
that everything's OK.
"Hey! Don't be sad," moms
say, "look at that child!
twisted like a pretzel,
yet still smiling,
always!"

So tonight
someone else breathes
behind this mask,
and Mom watches
as he zips from house
to house, rattling
his plastic pumpkin,
his blood buzzing
not from sugar
but from the realization
that humans embrace
their fears for one night
in an endless year

* * *

CHILD IN COSTUME (Version 2)*

My cousin can never decide
what to be for Halloween:
a princess? A mermaid? A mermaid princess?
For me it's easy: I'd like to be anything
other than what I am.

When I was born my parents
turned to stone. For seven years
I've smiled until it aches, held still
while doctors tightened screws
to lengthen, straighten my bones.

This Halloween someone else
goes trick-or-treating
with the mermaid princess; a stranger
who wriggles free from my mother's
grasp, runs headfirst into the dark.

The someone's breath smells sour
behind my mask, as he zips from house
to house, rattling my plastic pumpkin.
He begins to feel at home, to wish
that every night were Halloween.

He's collecting something sweeter
than candy. As these grown-ups smile
at his store-bought face, compliment
his blood red cape, he understands
why people kill for love.

(Editor’s Note: After Wordgathering accepted "Crippled Child in Costume," Wallace entirely rewrote the poem on the advice of another writer. The editors decided to print both versions and let readers decide for themselves, which version they like better and consider whether revision is always improvement.)

Austin Wallace taught English for three years in South Korea, and seven months in Russia. He now works as a freelance writer and devotes his free time to the disability rights movement.