Print PageSolar Damage
Erika Dreifus
Beneath thick January clouds I jog
and meet a stranger's eyes. Unimaginable,
that he will punch me in the forehead,
box cutters concealed within his fist.
Thirty-six stitches repair the gash
and newly-dyed-and-styled bangs disguise it.
Laser treatments, I am told, will heal the rest.
That first set of zaps and burns
indeed works wonders, as it should
for five hundred dollars, and it seems that
the scar will disappear with two or three more sessions.
After that, says the specialist, we'll turn to
my solar damage
In the 1970s, in Brooklyn, we children wore sunscreen
only on the hot summer days we spent
splashing in the local pool and
slurping sweet Italian ice by Brighton Beach.
The rest of the time, when not in school,
we played outside, lotionless.
House. Tag. Hopscotch.
Rode bicycles between apartment buildings and
skipped to the sidewalk's edge,
squinting down the street
to glimpse the ice cream trucks
before we heard their bells.
Days, weeks, months of city daylight
before the move to the suburban house,
where I retreated to the attic playroom,
cool basement den or, book in hand,
shady recess sidelines, while
new classmates played games--soccer, softball--
it already seemed late, too late to learn.
I tiptoed back beneath the sun as a teenager,
basting in baby oil beside my best friend.
Both of us intent on roasting
faster, brighter, deeper.
Solar damage there, I concede.
But not from those earlier days.
The new violent scar I will gladly yield.
Solar damage of free freckled youth
I embrace.
About the Author
Trained primarily as a prose writer, Erika Dreifus has published poetry in Babel Fruit, flashquake, New Vilna Review, and Migraine Expressions (Word Metro, 2008). A contributing writer for The Writer magazine and a member of the advisory board for J Journal: New Writing on Justice, she lives and writes in New York City, and she maintains a blog about writing and publishing at http://practicing-writing.blogspot.com.Published: December 26, 2009