Broken Bones

When I hit sixth grade

my heart hit a wall like breath knocking out of you

when you slam on the breaks of your bike.

It fell out of me

like shattered pieces of my dad's favorite beer glass

and my words jumbled 

and tumbled

and broke.

I had lost her.

So I scrawled crayon over all our memories

the swingsets in the neighborhood playground

knocking on her porch on the house across the street from mine. 

I tore up the state fair

the slumber party card games

the time we spent talking about our hopes and our dreams and our Barbie dolls.

And I laid there

tattered

not trying to pick up the pieces

or lift my own weight 

and superglue the porcelain fragments of my heart. 

I laid there and let time hit me like a wave

unchanging 

and devastated.

I felt the depths of the mariana's trench in my ribs.

But nobody came to help me pick up.

My daddy was at work and my mommy couldn't walk

and my brother was busy at a friend's house.

So with mangled limbs

I had to teach myself to sweep up the pieces.

So I did.

My head pounded like the heart that once was there

a fierce drum that rattled my skull

as I tried desperately to glue the pieces.

But glue didn't work

so I tried tape

and string

and zipties

until I found something that did.

My heart was whole again

and I had to learn to move it.

I took a step

and it beat once.

I took two steps.

It beat twice.

So I kept walking

and my heart kept beating

until I couldn't think about each beat

and my feet ached with hope and new memories and possibilities.

And by the time someone came

to help pick up the pieces

I had learned to walk again

and breathe again

and my heart beat once more.