chasing children justwrite

Each of my pupils is a seed. I try to see under water but sprout nothing until the sun comes up. By then we've already decided that frozen peas are quieter than sun-dried raisins. I scream while I shrink. There are roots clutching the folds of my brain, tight, like how I used to hold Dad's hand in the parking lot, knuckles white, snowflakes time-stopped on my skin, in the folds, stuck. When I can't see, swimming and drowning sound the same. I am a flightless bird perched on the edge of a skyscraper. I'm new to the city. The first person who ever held me was a farmer's wife, her hands rough and bloody, her face creased and kind, my eyes blind except to light. Your skin is like bread crust, at least according to Elizabeth. I think about crumbling. I remember feeling whole and then learning about broken plates, how you throw away a plate when it shatters. Always. Even if it was your favorite. Even if it's the only plate you'll ever have. I save broken dishes in the back of my top drawer, behind my underwear. I wish my hands could do anything besides write, wish they were made of glue, wish I could find all the pieces. There are vines feeling their way across my eyelids. There are branches tangled in my hair and birds' nests in my cousins' open palms. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, after the sun comes up. I'll let go of the skyscraper and call this city mine, knowing that really I'm a loaf of bread and the seeds in my eyes can't see anything but light.