An Afternoon at the Playground

The kids came streaming into the playground
boys in browns and blues and blacks
girls in pink and purple and red striped tights.

Their adults sat around on benches
trying not to look at their devices
though many failed.

There were scooters and bikes
and near-missed collisions.
There were boys climbing high untethered on bars.
There was digging and sliding and swinging—

until she made her entrance:

a five-year-old clad in leopard-print leggings, 
faux fur gold vest
over teal blue top paired with
sparkling Sunnies and little-girl-slides—

she sashayed the grounds
with her foxy grandma,
whose gray hair sported a slash of dark—
attracting the glances of even the keyboard crew.

I had to wonder who that girl would become
on this day when our last woman candidate
withdrew from the race.

Appeared in La Frontera magazine