Blood in Paris
by Christine Jackson
Outside my hotel balcony, dawn
seeps into the sky. Streetlights
across the hills wink off, as I
imagine families under red roofs
sipping café au lait. Spires pierce
the rising mist like these pains
drilling into my forehead. Time to go.
I park the rental in a dark public garage,
follow a drainpipe to the street,
and cross to Sorbonne Université.
Students look away, shrug at
the one picture I have of her.
One hit comes from Mr. Spiky Hair
in a leather vest: Yeh, I know her
from Chem II. Sorta looks like you.
I wait in the hall. On the hour,
students spill out. I compare picture, faces.
A cat-looking girl prances past. When
I call the name I know, she whirls
and runs,
screaming for help as I chase her
across the street, along the drainpipe
into the garage souterrain.
A uniformed gendarme glinting
with metal grabs me by the arm.
At le poste de police, grim men frown
across the table, point, accuse me.
You raised no daughter.
Correct. I didn’t. No need to mention
moonlit seduction, illness, no money.
I gave birth to a daughter then gave her
away. Now as my diseased heart pumps
weak blood, she needs to know that
I loved her, and I want her back.
Christine Jackson is retired and still recovering from her day job, professor of literature and creative writing at a South Florida university. She continues to clock in on a life-long night shift writing poetry. Her work has somehow shown in or is forthcoming in a motley assortment of online journals--Verse-Virtual, New Verse News, Anti Heroin Chic, Woodside Review, South Florida Poetry Journal, Engine (idling, and INDIGO.
