Darla dances on tables,
showing her monkey face
and the scar from her latest
hysterectomy. She may have
children somewhere —
she doesn’t know or can’t say.
She used to hunt with small
men, for lions, she says;
she was sent on a riverboat
as a gift for the pharaoh.
Like most Americans,
Darla confuses genealogy
and autobiography, assumes
she can’t be loved without
a story better than her own.