Scars Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Scars are there for you to remember,
An itch when the mosquitoes decide to pierce.
Slanted towards the sun while the book is read,
Hidden in the patio when the steaks have been eaten.
Saturnine, the eyes of relatives leave my sister’s
Wedding, but now we are talking hypothetically;
She has graduated into menstruating and cries embarrassedly
Into the towels of estranged relations, the dictionary
Used as decorations, the bowl of shells in the
Flickering light of the television; After the
Hurricane’s bate and tackle, the orange tree is limbless,
The cats are more fickle than curious,
And the cars whisper by the workplace brushed by
Debris; Every day the locksmith is called, and
Lipsticked truants escape high school to shoplift
In malls; even though it would be beautiful to escape
The form, the mind is wound: I took ecstasy at
Disney World, and everything skipped forward.
Snow White pleaded with me to rescue her, but later
On she made love standing up in the men’s bathroom.
We took the tram around the world where the borders
Of day and night were revealed. The scars remain for
Me to remember the white belt I earned in Karate;
It was so easy to blame myself, given the secrets of her
Swaying body.