Carla Schwartz

Playing blind man’s bluff I tripped on a sprinkler and got

the cut 

to beat

all cuts

the blade 

slices

the flesh

down

to bone

of hock

all pink

before

the blood

the shock

the Doc

the stitches—

34 out

in 17—

the scar

I wore

at 10

like a badge

shown off

to anyone

who asked

or didn’t

aged now

barely seen

but look

close—

my calf

the smooth

once gaping

opening

now filled in

a river

of skin.

Carla Schwartz’s poems have appeared in her collections Signs of Marriage; Mother, One More Thing; and Intimacy with the Wind. Learn more at https://carlapoet.com, or on all social media @cb99videos. Recent curations: Autumn Sky Poetry, Contemporary Haibun Online, MacQueen’s Quinterly, Modern Haiku, North Dakota Quarterly, One Art, and Rattle. Carla Schwartz received the NEPC E.E. Cummings Prize.