Muscle Memory

I lifted the cast iron from the stove today

and felt a sharp, familiar pop in the wrist.

It wasn't just the weight of the seasoned black,

but the way my tendons knew the twist.

Suddenly I was back in that hall by the lake,

bracing the door against a winter draft.

My mind had buried the lock and the break,

but my marrow kept a copy of the craft.

I looked at my face in the bottom of the pan,

a distorted shadow in the greasy light.

I’m the same person who turned and ran,

with the same bones that remember the fight.