Still I look up missing girls.

Between trees along the roadside, there is an umbrella.
Its great downturned blossom—bluebell or reverse tulip—
is small-world round and banded with turquoise, fuchsia,
pale pink—size is hard to gauge from here, but the brightly
budding colors dazzle schools on rainy mornings. 

                                                                                         Travel
down flamboyant petal and silver stem, to the handle,
which is red, and plastic, and curved to fit a smaller hand,
and there are thoughts of soft palms and paint that spills
off tiny nails and onto skin. 

                                                   Imagine the hands connect to arms,
connect to narrow mid-section and still maybe a child’s tummy,
to neck growing longer with years, to a head to eyes that blink
and well with changing feelings, hurt feelings, or something else?
 

Think of the hair, maybe long and brown and soft and wispy
and brushed that morning by a mother who trims it with kitchen
scissors and sprays in detangler, dresses it with dandelion, and
runs her hands across it and breathes as it dries.

                                                                                      And there is an umbrella
along the roadside, between the trees, and underneath is a broken
metal spoke that collapses a nylon rainbow against earth, and maybe
it was thrown in jubilation as the sun came out and the drops stopped
souping up the forest’s edge—and she took a shortcut home from the bus stop.