• Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

Willawaw Journal

Online Poetry & Art

  • Home
  • Journal
    • Willawaw Journal Fall 2022 Issue 15
    • Willawaw Journal Spring 2022 Issue 14
    • Willawaw Journal Fall 2021 Issue 13
    • Willawaw Journal – All Issues
  • Submissions
  • About
    • About the Journal
    • About the Editor
    • Behind-the-Scenes Creatives and Advisors
  • Contact

Leslie Rzeznik with Lewis Carroll

Alice Liddell as the Beggarmaid by Lewis Carroll

The Beggarmaid Speaks

You’d already given her Knaves and Queens,
talking hares and smoking caterpillars.
Certainly you could have saved a King for me, Lutwidge?

I am the dirt under her milk-white feet,
the moss she daren’t stain her rags
with where she rests her smooth-tressed head.
I am the grubs that eat the columbine.
I am the mason’s callouses that still rest between the married stone.

I am the pins that hold the ripped dress modestly in place.
But I am rusted and bent –
I’ve never seen the inside of a hat,
been kissed by a dressmaker’s lips,
or held a broken corset stay,
resting my head sweetly against perfumed skin.

She who dares the camera to look,
who holds the world in her palm,
an empty space waiting to be filled,
while I watch through a chink in the wall.

 

Leslie Rzeznik is a poet living in Michigan. She’s a Reiki Master, medicinal herbalist, intuitive, empath, and tarot reader of 30 years. She’s an elder in the Romuva (Lithuanian Indigenous) religion and she’s been published in Alyss, Bone Bouquet, Sling Magazine, Thank you for Swallowing, and Bear River Review.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Email
  • Print

Related

Footer

Stay In Touch

Subscribe to our mailing list for news about special events and the launch of the latest issue of Willawaw Journal.
* indicates required
We respect your privacy and will never sell or rent your personal information to third parties.

Support

Please make a donation here to support the running of Willawaw Journal. Thank you!

Support Willawaw Journal

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram

Submit to Willawaw Journal

Submit through Duosuma

Click to submit through Duosuma (opens in a new window/tab)

Copyright © 2023 Willawaw Journal, LLC · WordPress · site design by Yeda, LLC