First Lessons (Susan)

After supper my father and Uncle John
Sit in the living room
Smoke cigars, speak of crops.
We kids play tag on the porch,
Name the living room window
Home base.

First back, I win,
Rush with laughter
Toward my surprise.
It opens wide for me,
Translucent, gleaming mouth.
I enter the room
Swaddled in the sound of shattered glass.
The astonished men rush
To lift my body
From splintered light.

I might imagine how it looked to them,
My human arrow pointing toward their hearts,
But I am already beyond their reach,
Have entered the world of reality
Where pain is possible
And death,
Where everything
Shimmers
Silver and silent as the stars.

–Susan Schefflein
Draft © S. Schefflein 2006 All rights reserved.