twenty-four.

And
life is
better because
bandages are made
in the shape of crayons.

Remember being small, that summer
you fell out of the tree beyond the
clothesline. Blood welling up
along your arm building and
building until it tipped
down to drip from your
fingers and thunk
into the
dirt.

The sharp shock
of it, the stain that
never quite washed out of your
shoe.
      The pale fracture of the scar under
your fingers as you waited months later for the
second-grade school bus.

                          Such a thing, even
now, would be easier to bear if stamped
with CRAYON and colored green,
echoing with the colors that
swirled together the next
winter, melted down
the classroom
radiator
to drip in puddles
along the linoleum cracks,

                           the warm scent
of candles like a midnight vigil memory
overwhelming the sun as it watered
over the cracked sidewalk
and grimed
snow.