We’re in the car at the mall and my mother 

is crying because I have spent all my money

on a Care Bear the colour of soap. 

A star falls from its tummy, smiling. 

My new brother cries also, in the back. 

He is probably hungry. His hands are ugly 

pink claws. My father has not had new 

jeans for two years she says. I think rain

falls. She doesn’t mention the cancer

but it sits between us in the cold like

recrimination, with the powdered milk,

stale tostadas and Little Debbie cakes 

that dad brings home from supermarket 

dumpsters. Wish Bear smells clean and new. 

I touch the hard little heart on its bottom 

like a talisman, proof of its provenance, 

Louboutin red. I will be transfigured 

by its magic; the stars will smile for me.

In my bedroom the bear looks all wrong. 

I become ashamed of it, the acerbic green, 

its celluloid grin. It curses the house

with vermin: rat snakes nest in the eaves,

mice tumble through crumbling plaster.

My father’s jeans are still full of holes.

When all the other stuffed toys rot in storage

Wish Bear remains intact, bright-eyed, its red 

heart as hard as ever, its tummy trailing stars

like Lucifer hurled headlong flaming 

from the ethereal sky, its tongue whispering

fraudulent temptation. Pluck, it says, eat.