tattooed time

I used to think time healed.

I used to think scars would

fade if you put enough shea butter.

Like my mother told me.

But her scars were tattooed like skin.

Faux moles and freckles to pose as

invisible.

Her father’s death was ink to her body.

Shea butter could only keep it from flaking.

But time passes on pain like western expansion.

It’s mother’s umbilical cords

Incubating their babies with time.

It’s little girls feeling sad

Like something is caught in their throat

And mother lathering them down in lotion.

My mother called me boo.

Maybe it was my pale cloak

Of skin.

But now,

I feel haunted

By the scars that were printed

On my paper flesh the day I was born.

I’m scared like my mother was.

I’ve felt her pain for years

And carried it like my own.

Now I’ve birthed this ball of pain

Masked in lissome skin.

Listen, do you hear it crying?

No, no lotion, no time.

Her skin is so smooth.

Her skin is so pale.

So spotless so supple

Untarnished by time.

She’s baby brand new!

No, I hear the crying.

I hear the ink trickling like poison.

My mother never told me, but I’ll tell you.

That pain spreads like time and

time spreads the pain.

I tattooed the invisible ink with black clouds

To prove there was something there.

Wear it.

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