French Fries

You fly out Sunday. Take the little girl
she'll have a fortnight with a father
she hasn't seen for years. The one
who shirks all his duties, leaving you
then shacking up with a girl from work.
It's Summer there, the baking heat.
You're grilling french fries, her dinner
a little bunch of hardened twigs, a Kiev.
You don't eat, have thinned since
the wedding pics - you a bonny bride
his sunkissed Aussie hair.
That day: natural highlights, smiles.
Already your guilty secret flowering
under the bouquet. What if
you say, he doesn't give her back?
You smoke, look out at the freezing street.
Her bike, the rear wheel spinning still
lies on the path. What if, you say,
she doesn't want to come with me?
Gaunt with raising her alone,
you tell me - you've got to risk it.
It can't be you that breaks a daughter's heart.