---

Hitchhike Hood

by Milla van der Have


She wants to be gone.
 
I can see her take stock
by the side of the road
counting trash like flowers:
 
bones of course, but also
little specks of plastic
that seem to serve no purpose;
 
cigarette butts, trampled
catch-weeds and brown
skulking leaves, shed like
 
youth; a collar, she weighs
on her hand as if wanted,
thinks for a minute,
 
(and I tremble, shy away
into the undergrowth)
 
then puts it in her jacket.
In a moment, she'll straighten,
raise her hand, be out of here.
 
​​​

Milla van der Have (1975) wrote her first poem at 16, during a physics class. She has been writing ever since. In 2015 she published her first chapbook: Ghosts of Old Virginny. Milla lives and works in Utrecht, The Netherlands.