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Disappearing

Sisters, you once told me,
stay together for ever, hearts
enfolded into little protective shells.
You rolled out cookie dough and
cut the slab, snowmen and flowers and
sugary snails.

I was just a little girl, fascinated
by the intricate swirls in which
you did your hair, burning with questions
that polarized answers and pulled them
from your very innards.

You were so old in spirit
your back curved under the weight of your
thoughts, and the luster of your hair
could protect you from bullets, could
save me from anything.

You were bruised
black and blue, and your heart burned with all the lies:
I slipped on ice and bruised my cheek, I walked
into a door and blackened my eye.

Sisters stick together, you whispered
when my tears coagulated like fat
little monsters, racing down my cheeks, the first
time I'd ever been hit, a slight pinch on my forearm
that paled next to your blue face.

It had been such a long time that
it took me weeks to remember these
mementos I'd tucked deep into my gut.
The years were passed by under the
hollow of your blood, searching
for hallucinations that never did come.

I lost you the way some people fall in love,
until all at once you returned like
a blue-winged butterfly to settle
in the damp earth and absorb my tears.
Sisters are forever, the wind whispers.

I press my hand against your cheek.
I love you, you know. I have never said.
The words free you from yourself
and even as I kiss you goodbye,
your essence flutters away, leaving
your black and blue drugged body
behind.

written 12/9/2014
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