Pierced

Thinking about the way a memory can sting like a needle to skin like the time I pierced my cartilage to prove I could take the pain. I stood by the mirror with applied pressure waiting for the blood to dry. Still it wasn’t enough to heal the wound and so now I’m here hovering over a new body of water praying for a different type of cure. If my thoughts can fall to the surface of the sand then maybe they can wash away with the pull of the tide.

The nights I spent mildly buzzed and too nervous to pee in your bathroom. How many times did I run the water and pray for relaxation? Thinking about the first time you grabbed my hand like maybe you had done it by mistake. You checked to see if my cut was healing okay and then we measured height discrepancies palm to palm. Whichever trick we chose to break the invisible wall the thought still bleeds a little but less and less. And I know pretty soon the sun will set the water will chill and I’ll be able to walk back to the house on the hill and watch from a distance as all of it sinks by way of the sea.