Im Still Not Going To Tell You What I Wished For

these three wishes
tucked into
a hollowed out wooden apple

from the World's Fair
1964 I packed or thought I did,
with an alabaster heart

rose coloured marble
from Italy! the child magazine ad
proclaimed genuine alabaster

rose with marbled veins
paperweight paperweight
the colour of roses

I sighed spending all my allowance
let me go back and retrieve it
now

and the necklace that sparkled like
the aurora borealis (we knew what that was)
Kids! buy it soon, they'll all be gone by noon

they're selling like hotcakes.
a heart weighted, the colour of roses
a necklace made of stars

I wanted then. A wooden apple's teaset secret
packed so small inside
I remember these things

why didn't I think to bring them with me?
and how were they scattered to the winds
now they won't come back to me

even in handpainted dreams
though I search wide in every
out of the way lost and found

while phantom news bulletins declaim:
the search is widening

and with a lime green sparkly net

to catch them out
amongst all the spangly residue
of the lost worlds.

mary angela douglas 1 october 2017