Amy Acre

---

---

Daddy Pig

Once a time. This Daddy. This Mummy.
This babies. Whee-oh! Whee-oh! Whee-oh!
Uh oh. Don’t worry. The end.
                                                      —Billie

at two this kid knows jeopardy
that without it we have no story

that without story we are no one
that no one is just someone who wasn’t saved

someone was saved is the story:
the pups save the monkey-naut

daddy pig drops his keys down the drain
and mr bull digs up the road

milk soothes a gumsore smile
as new teeth pull up a chair

at two this kid knows jeopardy but not
how it shifts when you’re done growing

how danger becomes a growing stack of envelopes
how your phone is the face of a predator

and a predator is your own face in photographs
glancing offstage in terror and confusion

it is terrible and confusing to be
the same story day after day

to be saved at the same point every time
to look over the edge but never smash

you see a piece of yourself on the ground
and just leave it there

maybe you’ll come back to it later
maybe it’s the only piece that made it

---

---

---

---

AMY ACRE is the editor of Bad Betty Press, and the author of two pamphlets: And They Are Covered in Gold Light and Where We’re Going, We Don’t Need Roads, each chosen as a PBS Pamphlet Choice.