Louis Gallo

CUSTODY

Once upon a time there was no time.
It held us like water.

The minutes were monsters
sewn out of hatred.

They steal the young princess
from the house of her father.

She grows up a stranger,
he falls into darkness.

A lord without light,
he prays that this story

will end without ending
or end right.

—from Rattle #41, Fall 2013
Tribute to Single Parent Poets

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Louis Gallo: “I have written poetry all my life. I have no choice. It is a compulsion. I’d be a lot richer if it were not! But it gives me a joy I find nowhere else, not even in fine vino. And I still don’t quite know what it is … poetry, that is. I was a single parent for quite a few years, starting when my daughter was five years old. After the divorce, of course. Every possible obstruction was levied against me by the courts and lawyers for reasons I have detailed in my novel Life Beside Itself: The Abductions. I wanted the poem ‘Custody’ to assume the flavor of a fairy tale or children’s poem in order to, hopefully, drain out the sentimentality that sinks many of the other poems that I have attempted on the subject. It is the most difficult subject for poets—the loss of their beloved children.” (web)