On the underside your forearm.
Gossamer skin loosely wraps dry bones
Like the butcher’s newspaper over ribs.
Your squishy flesh is molded by the
weight of your
Little head and matted brown hair
That flashes gold sometimes in the light.

Tomorrow you will leave home.
You will say farewell to the lawn pebbles
That look like curious mochi balls for squirrels
When snow sleeps lazily upon them.
You lay your head down sideways
Pressing your ear against the pale green veins on the underside of your arm
that are the sage grandfathers of the ones that show up
On your eyelids when they close.
The weave work of the green, bulging lines
Make you remember the creek
In which you sunk beneath the unforgiving water
And hoped with all your might
That someday you’d marry a mermaid.
You heard these waves
When you listened to the surge of your blood
From your heart
To somewhere beyond here.