September Poems (2023)

Losing Childhood

It happened one night—
a quiet,
winter night.
The sky was softly snowing.

It snuck up on me soundlessly; like a
charcoal-drawn fox wading
through the snow and the shadows.

Suddenly he nipped me,
not altogether unpleasantly.
It was not the pain
that disturbed me, rather

the abruptness of it,
the swiftness of blood
that followed.

Startled, I went
to wipe it away and
overlooked the presence of the fox
that stares at me even now,

head resting
on its paws,
eyes glinting
gold,

and there the wound remains:
dried caked blood turning brown
over a wound still mysterious to me,

until inevitably
I fall asleep, begin
to dream; immediately
the fox stalks up
to my side, licks the wound
and makes it clean;

through the dreams I feel
myself healing.