Assume the day
Gives you no visible marks.

In sleep
Your desires derby-race
To a pit
Where bruises gather
In oil slicks.

Immigrant bruises
With stumbling speech,
Refugees who travel
On the decks of decaying ships.
Some have family names,
Some no names at all.

Sweetladymidnight bruises,
Perfumed knocks,
Blows, insults,
Curses of substance.

A host of bruises
In lumby clothes,
A militia.

Massive, fernlike bruises
Delicate
As an afternoon insult.

Suppose one pummels its way out
Tonight.
Did it begin
The day your father
Cursed you?

The time your mother
Stood at the sink
And cried from a slap,
The smell of bleach,
Lemons, and vanilla
Lost in the clotheswhip air
Of March?

In sleep, the bruises
Bicker and shuffle,
An uprising of old plums.

- Natalie Kenvin