It’s Not Personal
for Ellie Butler & her sister
- Emily
Critchley (U.K.)
Born
not into this world, but entangled,
impact
hardest hit on landing – and he knew
she
knew she was a punching bag because her mother
had
before her, and her sister, and there were the exes
before
that, now strewing tears on daytime television,
and the
public stranglings and the pregnant girlfriend
and the
retinal haemorrhages and the burns on her fingers
and her
forehead (at 5 weeks) and the little broken arm
and
exoneration from the judge and incredulity from everyone.
Trouble
is she had no say because she was only
five years old.
And
although several key professionals engaged purposefully,
directly,
there is a general lack of focus on the child
or on
her sister as individuals and their
wishes,
feelings and characters do not feature
strongly
because
she was only five years old – the other even younger –
inchoate
human beings that never really counted
among
the stinging branches and the scalding currents,
the expert
testimonies and the legal wranglings. And we know,
have
heard it said, how important it is for kids
to be
with their parents: that special bond, those precious rights,
the
swirling currents – impact of which will be referred to later.
Because
now the child is dead; she had her head
bashed in.
All narrative and professional attention is paid
[following
a state apology] to the say-so of her
[grown-up] parents.
The
child – she knew and begged not to be
taken
back to
“the bad house” – has come and gone.
Brief
promise of a human being petrified
in
tears who stumbled, briefly, into the dark fray
of
familial love that spins about the centre of this world /
stamps
its expert seal on everything and knows,
she
knew, we all know how it happened, how it never should,
and how
it will again.