The Scar; or, The Zipper

A girl in my class once had a scar,
a painful smile, all teeth and skin
climbing vertically up, a perfect zipper
and I used to imagine her sunbathing
opening the zipper to let in the sunlight
and again in the morning, to let out the
darkness and bad dreams
and sometimes to let out sounds and words,
sounds and words that shrilled and whistled
as they rocketed away through the air;
I watched her in class, sitting ramrod straight
as the teacher stabbed at the words on the board,
I atrophy / You atrophy / He, she, it atrophies...
and the scar smiled and smiled, a Cheshire-cat,
a Cheshire-scar - Curious / More curious / Most curious.
Then one day the girl didn't come to class and
she never returned; but still the teacher
impaled those words on the end of her pointer,
We atrophy / They atrophy / I atrophy / You atrophy...
I imagined the girl, pale in the night, opening
the zipper to let in the moonlight; (Medieval
physicians believed purging was healthful for the body.
Bloodletting was frequently used to treat illness) but
she didn't stop there, she opened and opened it,
venturing into new territory, purging --
words spilling out, tickling or burning, emotions
like candle flames burning the darkness,
stop-motion memories hovering like ghosts,
crackling dreams, quivering and sparking with her
lifeblood; more and more, wild colors and frenzied
noises and images that seared with their halos
around them like the sun's corona.
And the scar, it smiled wider and wider, purging
and purging -- and then, in a blaze
of light and sound, she molted, threw off
her skin and shot like a meteor through
the despotism of the endless night.