Originally published in Dogwood, Spring 2021

On Being Asked, Are You A Boy Or A Girl? 

again and again and again, always
like licking a battery. Taste the memory
of running, my arms wrapped 
around that pickle jar, not a pickle jar,
a terrarium, packed with garden snails,
shells striped, black and amber,
not tiger fur, but just the same,
each body heavy like a child’s heart.
Imagine holding it, staccato beating,
small and sticky in your rough hands,
but they were mollusks
hand picked from moist caves
of purple allium and marigold,
plopped one by one into a wonderland
of torn grass, snapped twigs and
plucked leaves-all bruised and wilting.
I was running back home,
a slimy gift for my mother, I’d not tied 
my shoes, loose, wild,
when the pavement yanked,
wonderland fell, burst beneath me. 
I threw my hands forward
to catch my fall and a shattered protest
screamed thousands of tears, holes
into my hands, my legs, my head.
Splinters and gashes, some deeper 
than others and thinking back 
on it now, you know,
I can still feel the glass
in my hands.