And the boy is packing shirts
pocketing the keys that will
hurtle him beyond the love
that broke him, that stood him
in the gleam of filling stations
reading the black alphabet
of the night, falling voices
in the rain drumming fingertips
on station wagons, lawn furniture,
motionless pools of blue as if
gods perched on streetlights
impatient for whatever it was
that drove him to break open
his rind of days like a pomegranate,
bite hard, each day gleaming
in his mouth as he spat red tooth
after red tooth after red tooth
into the tiny suitcase he left
at the end of the garden path
for his father to find.
Written in response to Scotland, You’re No Mine(this link will open in a new window) by Hannah Lavery.