Permanent Impression

It was buried under a pile of dead menus

and batteries that leaked their white crust.

I pulled out the yellow Ticonderoga,

the wood splintered, the paint turned to dust.

But there, near the end, where you held it,

are the deep, rhythmic craters of your jaw.

You were shouting about the rent or the car,

grinding your stress into a jagged, wooden flaw.

I ran my thumb over the hills of that plastic,

a map of a temper I thought I’d outgrown.

It’s strange how the cedar keeps the panic

long after the mouth has left it alone.