Dirt-Free

i.
the flowers bloom in a
tangled mess of vibrant
colours, a glare
upon white sheets and
clean floors –

the stench of metal
is fading into
dry-petal
roses on top of the
drawers, crushed
with broken hands.

ii.
she has eyes framed in
lashes that were once
the centre of attention for scribbled
drawings, and
she opens them slowly,

and,
oh,
they’re not red-rimmed
today, or
crusted together
with shivers of forgotten
sleep.

iii.
it is a wonder
that her hands are
not broken right now and her
hips aren’t cracking
under
the pressure:

it is a day of
healing, a break
within blue-
blue.

iv.
she smiles with genuine
lips, the taste of
wilderness lurking on her tongue;
somewhere
inside lies a dark-
eyed monster, bitten with
malice.

but it doesn’t matter in this single
moment of sunlight.

v.
red, orange, yellow,
green, blue, indigo –
bottles of ink swirling in slow-
running veins

until they pop,
pop, pop
like shining bubbles as
grief on the
too-sharp blades of grass.

vi.
the morn is icy under
her paper skin, pasty with rose –
but
buckets still make her
giggle, and her bones still

creak
with whispers to keep
her from loneliness,
with the cry of help
as train
tracks,
ladders climbing higher.

vii.
when she stares
at her stomach, it is still
screaming scars,
but her eyes catch the light
and sparkle;

she dresses
in four layers to
weigh her colours down.

viii.
but that does not work
and she is
a grinning fool to everything,
laughing when she
breaks a hollow bone and
fixes it
with masking tape –

and
oh, there’s a sun,
and she has a friend,
and, oh my,
she can see the ground
far below her.

ix.
for one day,
she cradles roses in her cheeks,
grass in her toes,
skies in her eyes;

sunflowers bloom in her
bones and sunrises replace
memories
and love beads
like blood on her small
lips.

x.
and
she is clean.