To Be A Boy With Curly Hair

In Memoriam, March 2013

by Benjamin Rigby

Note from the Editors: If viewing on a mobile device, formatting for this piece is best viewed in landscape mode.

  Hear the bones   grind   behind a smile;

     from a photo lying by omission,

    as a boy with curly hair stands out among peers. 

       See the knees   twist    and     burn   below

               a body    captured  as it was back then; 

          when those spewing acid 

      and blood received the most affection. 

This one –  clean enough to smell Elmer’s 

          and Crayola  –  cracking   scratching surface skin 

              from flaming knuckles.

Cartilage 

like wax melting

         all across his frail frame,

warm to the touch,                 as this form folds 

like cheap cardstock. 

The leg 

trapped in plaster 

         after pouring out the cremains 

 of a scorched hip pyre; 

      filling a cast with acetabulum ashes. 

Light flashes, shutter closes,

so this painted memory 

of a boy with curly hair 

stands tall on his mother’s piano.