Yellow Sweater

My room still has its baby-books:

toadstools,
and toads that sit under them.

A place to shelter 
is a precious thing. 

When it rains,
I read words becuase they are lovely, 

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire.

My bed was a nest of rag blankets and hand sewn pillows. My walls were plastered with old band posters and vague sketches of my dreams. I didn’t have any shelves, but I amassed books. More than I could ever read.

I thought it was the dark that tore me apart. I thought it was the terrible shape of the night, the thick sculptable nothingness. But no, it was the thin tinny morning.

Smooth jazz glossed the city. 
We danced to lamplight and gutter smell. 

You dreamed of the country, 
of a body filled with blueberries, 
and cream pouring from the clouds.

But the city shook us. 

Does it ache to grow?
Does it steal your breath, 
and your body? 

At 11, 
as I began to blossom: 
Breasts, Bellicosity, and Beauty, 
I got sick. 

MONO.
Mononucleosis