September

It was September, I think,
when I grabbed your knotty hair,

ripped off those stupid ears of yours
and flung them to the middle of nowhere.

I set down all my secrets that laid flat on scabbed-up wrists.
“Why, though?” you asked.

Here goes another conversation soon to be dismissed.
When your eyelashes ran down into unusable thread,

it was dirty, unkempt asphalt I made you heavily tread
and when all that nonsense was put to rest

I tucked you into bed
and sweetly slipped your heart back in your chest

told you a bedtime story, the one about the rabbit
and you cried and I sighed because

it was an unconventional habit, one we probably shouldn’t make
but a habit’s still a habit, and sadly,

this is one we’ll never break.

Emily Smith lives in Cedar Key, Florida. She and Maria met on Google Buzz as kids and the rest is history. This poem was written circa 2013, when she was 14 years old.