at two years old,
your curious hands
happened upon a bottle of
flea medicine
that lay waiting on the counter.
your mother was absent as usual,
off on an errand,
or walking the dog.
unwatched,
your enterprising fingers
eased the lid from the container,
and you poured the sweet-smelling
liquid down your throat.
the world was still so new to you,
and it seemed to be made for tasting.
who could blame a child
with a thirst for more than
mushy peas and applesauce?
two days later
they released you from the hospital,
your stomach pumped dry.

when you were six,
idly exploring the woods of your mother’s
sprawling estate,
you paused a moment from imagining
faerie queens flitting about in the greenery
to take rest on a log,
your undiscerning eye not betraying
its secret: within it was a nest
of wasps,
and thinking they were faeries
you dared not move as they
rose in a cloud above your head
and overtook you,
leaving your body peppered with
painful angry sores.
you fell to the ground.
a hired man,
strong and tall as the oak trees,
saw your quick descent and
ventured after you,
made a hammock of his arms
to bear you like a fallen soldier
back to your mother’s house,
his tough sun-leathered skin
immune to the assaults of the
faerie battalion.

at eight,
playing in the small child-sized house
in your aunt’s garden,
you sought to make stained glass
from the broken shards of the playhouse window.
having no tool at hand,
what better way to
shatter the clear, flat plane
than with your fist?
before reason could take hold of you,
you drove your hand
through the glass,
and the raw edges cut deep into your veins.
blood flowed in rivers
from your wrist.
your aunt, ever watchful,
rushed from the house to
stop your body’s catharsis
with a dishcloth.
the jagged unpainted shards
lay forgotten on the ground.