Trigger Warning
When I fall up the front steps
layers of skin scrape off,
forearms still hold fast
to parcels I won’t even remember
later on.
I slam hard.
The retaining wall catches me with splinters.
And for one whole week,
when I raise my arms to speak,
(or just to lift books to the shelves),
people will ask in a concerned way,
Oh, what happened?
And gasp and laugh and recognize
the story as if it were their own.
At the end of the week,
there is no more asking,
only two faint pink lines,
like eyes that
look out of the wound,
tiny bumps
I will run my fingers over
again, and again,
when thinking.