Scars

The jagged cut, now pink and shiny, on the back of my calf

The long slice, curved like the moon, over my hip

The indentation on my upper left thigh from a fall on the concrete front step

The round white place under my eyebrow where I over-troubled a zit

The slice a dull knife took from my index finger

(Nora's fine lines on the soft underside of her arm, discovered on the Fourth of July)

The chipped teeth

The bleeding cuticles

The heart cracked open over and over and over again, reset, reassembled, bandaged, Frankensteinally reanimated

The grooves worn into my brain, and the new glowing neural pathways I am forging