I have two bruises on my shoulders blue as the oceans and marbled white, storm-foam spilling from my head and eyes. Thatβs not your responsibility-- but what else could it have been when I knelt silent, scrubbing, palms red as my sisterβs sticky wrists, clorox wipes balled and piled in the corner? I am not steel-skinned, some mechanical being mistaken for a human with her eyelids torn from her face, blindless to trauma and the callouses it leaves behind. And yet the oceans on my shoulders blow salt healing the wounds to smooth, pink scars, reminders in every mirrored surface: I am still standing.