The Bullrush Confession by Elizabeth Loudon
The Bullrush Confession
I never liked the Sunday people.
Their stiff clothes, the way they won’t smile when smiled at.
I took a detour to avoid them.
A pathetic bleating made me turn round.
Kittens, I thought, when I saw the rough bundle
on a doorstep, wrapped in Madonna blue.
Not kittens. Something else living,
unable to care for itself in the dangerous cold.
Perhaps the police had been called
and would come to remove it,
perhaps they’d think it was me who abandoned it.
I grabbed it and walked away fast.
In the quiet of my own home, I did my best.
I’m good at some of it—bearing witness, taking notes.
Not so good at the business with hands and milk.
I slept late, hoping to wake up better equipped.
Another woman should take care of it, I thought,
somebody who can teach it the names of plants.
I wrapped it in blue again and wrote Free to any good home
like it was a wasp-blown apple in a crate.
Then, I opened the door and left it on the doorstep.
It was still there in the morning, a scrap of need
protesting its own failed adoption.
Then, I remembered that we’re never more than
a stone’s throw away from a rat.
What if the rat.
You know how this ends. I wrote a petition
and nailed it to my door.
By morning somebody had ripped it down.
Outside my door, I can hear the rattle
of a tin held out for coins.
A lost child begs on my stoop, and sooner or later,
I’ll have to go out for coffee or bread, stepping round her
as if she’s not there. Beyond that,
there is no redemption.
About the Author
Elizabeth Loudon’s debut novel A Stranger In Baghdad was published in 2023 (Hoopoe, AUC). Her work has appeared in, among others, Trampset, One Art Poetry, Blue Mountain Review, Amsterdam Review, Saranac Review, Whale Road Review, Gettysburg Review, North American Review, and Denver Quarterly. A dual US/UK citizen, she now lives in rural southwest England. She can be found at @ESLoudon, and www.elizabethloudon.com.