Scraped Palms

It is almost dawn and I’m running towards my front porch,

drunk off Strongbow ciders. I barely make it two steps

before I slide across pavement, and blood is seeping

out and around the pebbles lodged into my skin.

Suddenly I’m laughing while my neighbors sleep inside,

because I am twenty and my palms are bleeding

the way they used to when I was seven,

flying through the streets of Croatia.

The sun is beating down on my shoulders

while I search for a hiding spot.

I trip and scrape my hands and knees

and I think I sprained my pinky finger.

I get up and keep running until

I reach the rose bushes behind the old house.

I throw myself into the thorns and petals,

pain doesn’t exist to a child playing Hide and Seek.

The neighborhood kids finally find me, I won again.

The thorns are tearing into my skin 

as I emerge from the bushes victorious.

My aunt is lecturing me now but all I hear 

is my friends playing outside. She’s pressing a cloth 

soaked in Rakija on my wounds.

She tapes a popsicle stick from the garbage around my pinky

and washes away the dirt and blood from my palms.

I’m off and running again towards 

the sounds of children’s laughter and old ladies 

yelling at them from their windows to quiet down.

I am twenty with scraped palms, laughing and crying in the street,

Admiring my cuts and bruises that resemble those of my childhood,

When getting hurt was purely physical, and scars made me feel tough.

I am twenty with scraped palms, and this feeling is sweeter 

Than any drink I’ve ordered at Jackie Rielly’s,

I stay there, kneeling in the road while the blood dries.