Elegy in Late Spring

The sheriff tells me not to touch

her mouth. There might be evidence

between her teeth, needling the gums.

He waits for me to say goodbye

to a fractured wrist, the berry-swell

where knuckles pressed her neck,

the gelid spill where someone yanked

her pigtails up: a lickerish kiss,

and down: an eggshell skull, cement.

I nod. They zip her up in black.

My father had said You shouldn’t chase

your sister through the streets. She’s scared

of playing freeze-tag after dark.

But I kept it up: the game where she learned

a scream so loud it couldn’t come out,

the way a body petrified.

I threaded her through the lilac night

as if my hand would be the last

to touch her hair. As if my teeth

could never flash in a stranger’s mouth.