Bambola

Denise O’Hagan

Whose demon are you, whose god?

—Charles Simic, ‘Head of a Doll’

She is nothing if not patient.

For she knows

what it’s like to be unloved, have

her flaxen hair shorn to a stubble,

and be hurled from a third-floor balcony

in a fit of pique. Salvaged by neighbours

who didn’t know what they were dealing with,

her eyes shone a darker shade of blue.

Unkillable,

she’s adept at occupying silent spaces,

propped up on the highest shelves,

or slumped in the shadowy recesses

of rarely opened cupboards

in her back-buttoned, ribbon-belted,

blue flared knitted dress.

I look at the box. I can feel her there,

with her palely bulging forehead,

button nose, her pursed cherry lips;

her missing leg exposing, through

the perfect circle of her thigh joint,

the cavernous depths of her trunk.

Just when it’s all getting too much,

I sense redemption

at her extremities: the fine whorls

of her ears, the puckered flesh

of childish fingers, and know she is seeping

into my mind, exacting sweet revenge

mulled over decades to a sickly consistency,

her words masquerading as my own.

I cower in the corner of the room.

Her lashless eyes dare me to put an end to this,

bright in the knowledge that, even

after all these years (restoration being

out of the question), I still flinch

at throwing her out.

She knows the value of silence. Of waiting.

And it’s her time—

DENISE O’HAGAN is a Sydney-based editor and poet, born in Rome. Her poetry is published internationally and her recent awards include the Monica Taylor Poetry Prize and the NSW Poetry Prize. She is currently writer in residence at Don Bank Museum, Sydney. denise-ohagan.com