A History Of Scratching Poem by Brian Rihlmann

She'd slather me
in the pink stuff and say,
"Don't scratch,
or it'll spread."

So I'd lay there,
covered in poison ivy
from my neck,
to my balls,
down to my toes,
itchy and miserable
and trying not to scratch,
as sweat trickled
on a hot humid summer night.

Maybe it taught me something.

I look back on the history
of the human race
on this spinning rock,
and it seems like
a story of scratching
things we shouldn't have.

The whole earth now
a giant rash,
not enough pink stuff
in the universe
to soothe the itching.