[reading you like a book]

reading you like a book
turning pages over,
some crisp,
some torn and tattered

spots from tears and pools of blood

your chapters read like movie scripts
rising, falling,
with the turning
of faces, places

looks through raindroppped windows
and the pattering of feet
through subway shoots

today you're battling robots
tomorrow you'll be rocking
sadly in the corner
of a basement room
away from all this falling
apart

the slightly dusted scent
between your pages
like wood polish with a hint of glue

and the glue holding you all together
the binding, sewn thick and twisted
round your spine like

the fingers of a newborn clutching
daddy's hand,
looking up with fresh new eyes

because you are a book too often
unopened,
left to pure devices,
handprints in the snow of
my memory,

and i will keep you clean