"Wound" by M. Nasorri Pavone

She guessed he felt badly by how he bandaged

the knee, checking it daily, taking her mother’s place

in the fix-it department. She accepted his good

cheer and gentle touch as an apology.

She looked at the wound in wonder, the puss crown

with its yellow cream. How loud its rawness

announced itself each morning at the unveiling.

She thought, Should a bandage be pulled off slowly

or quickly? Which one hurts less? Neither, she learned.

It took three weeks for the scrape to heal.

It was larger and more infected than any she’d created.

When her father picked her up off her tricycle

and threw her in the driveway, it wasn’t because

she’d angered him, though that shouldn’t have mattered

but it did. She’d been the object within reach.

Years later the knee’s darker patch of skin

still stares its sad and blackened eye.

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M. Nasorri Pavone’s poetry has appeared in River Styx, Sycamore Review, New Letters, The Cortland Review, Sheila-Na-Gig, GHLL, Cura, Rise Up Review, Pirene’s Fountain, Chaparral, Poemeleon, Wild Goose Review, The Citron Review and elsewhere with poems forthcoming in Packingtown Review and Rhino. She’s been anthologized in Beyond the Lyric Moment (Tebot Bach, 2014), and has been nominated for Best of the Net and twice for a Pushcart Prize.