The Little Girl Who Gave Zero Fucks. J. Davis Milton

care:

      Those fucks in her basket were going nowhere!

      Friends might call her crazy, a terrorist too,

      But Elodie-Rose

      Had wondered

      And pondered

      And thought it important

      That when you have fucks,

      Those fucks should

      belong to just you.

      Courageous, a soldier, such difference she yearned

      To make to the words and the habits she’d learned.

      But her mum had told her to play by the rules,

      In houses and shops and in gardens and schools.

      So, like clouds float in silence to make the rain fall,

      Our girl left the house saying nothing at all.

      Skipping to school, her young brain gave a buzz,

      Arms tingling and shaking, breath short, just because

      Thoughts diving and swimming within her today:

      Is this normal? Does everyone else feel this way?

      Like tornadoes move earth,

      make the air thick with dust,

      She was puzzled, whilst walking

      to board the school bus.

      But excitement was bubbling: she’d tell all her friends

      Of the plans for the fucks and the baskets to end!

      Waving madly, assuming these two girls had seen her –

      One pal was named Marge and the other Edwina –

      But rarely it happens, as you’ll understand,

      That reactions from others will go just as planned.

      This morning their four eyes were black as black soot

      Or like two mouldy grapes in a basket of fruit.

      Pair of icy blue faces, contorted and stretched,

      Greeted Elodie-Rose as she climbed the bus steps.

      Said Edwina: ‘I think you’re wrong in the head.

      I heard someone tell someone that someone had said.’

      Marge nodded and tutted and furrowed her brow,

      ‘We were best friends on Monday; we’re not best friends now!’

      ‘Don’t ask any reasons,’ they chorused and leered,

      ‘Just that he said that she said that he said you’re weird!’

      Normally Elodie-Rose’s pure dear heart would sink,

      So preoccupied, girls, with what other girls think.

      ‘Now move down the bus. There’s no seats – you should stand!’

      Marge grimaced and giggled and held out her hand,

      Demanding a fuck from poor Elodie-Rose,

      Who had pouted her lips and sat silent and froze.

      Flighty bile of the bullies, she thought it unfair

      And most often got mocked for her big frizzy hair.

      In heatwaves most fucks were gone by double science,

      Today, Elodie-Rose’s curls slapped her face in defiance

      As she shook her head back to the back of the bus

      And peeped out of the window without any fuss.

      Daydreamed about wizards and roses and stars,

      Ignoring the bullies, Edwina and Marge.

      Once again, this buzzing emerged in her mind.

      Not thoughts for the girls who had been so unkind