The Line

The line cuts across my shoulder

like I drew it there myself,

like I measured it with the tank top

and said yes here, no there,

and then forgot I'd said it at all.

I keep picking at the edge.

Just the dead skin, the white part,

the part that's already leaving anyway.

I'm just helping it along.

I'm just admitting what the sun already knew.

Saturday. Their house. I said I wasn't going back.

I went back.

I sat in a chair and drank something

and didn't move for three hours

because moving meant thinking about why I came,

what I was looking for,

whether I'd find it.

The line doesn't care about reasons.

The line just marks the boundary.

Tank top. No tank top.

Covered. Exposed.

Before. After.

Now it's three days later

and the peel is happening

and I'm standing in the bathroom

picking at myself

like I can undo the afternoon

by removing the evidence,

like if I'm careful enough

I can erase the straight line

and convince my skin

it was never there.

But it was. It is.

My shoulder keeps time

like a sundial.

Like a confession.

Like a clock that runs backwards

and lands on Saturday

every time I look at it.