Green oak

On the distance between then and now

Sister, she screams me over her tobacco hair,

ahead on the train tracks on her bike I can’t ride

behind the old stable I hid from her in,

counting spider webs and lining glass jars

for the blue sunshine to warm my dusty hands.

Don’t take them back there,

I am scared of the boys in their mean clothes

and their laughs that go nowhere as I chase them

behind the trees and crawl like I am Tigerlily

in a room with big guns that deafen their footsteps.

The dog smiles at me and he is my army in the trenches,

behind her pile of dolls she won’t fight me for.

His puppy breath I feel on my neck, it is playtime

and he makes too much noise in the autumn paper.

I lie down in his thick fur on the bed under the waves

of the forest that she said was ours, by the old house

where she helped me bury my parakeets and now I

stare at her for as long as she lets me.

Her best friend skin and the circles of sun around her

when she showed me how to lace my skates on the pond

where she met the boys who tell me I’m ugly and

throw rocks at my wolf.

We sleep in the woods until he hears mom and runs for kibble,

and then I alone as the caterpillars inch my arms on the dark bed

and I stay here until she will get into trouble and come pull me out

of the needles and I get to see her again.