There’s A Five-Year-Old Behind My Pancreas

When hot water hits open cuts

The day is done

Look at those hands incredulously

The same way you did when you were five

Look at dad’s hands, they’re all black

You’ll never let your hands get like that

They’re so big

Yours will be big like that, and that’s okay

But yours will never be cut

You’ll take care of your hands

There won’t be hard spots on your toes

You’ll keep them soft

Because it feels so good to run your clean hands

On the flat of your soft five-year-old toes

Even the fingernails are nice

Something an old man could write about

There’s a cut on the left hand around the thumb and forefinger

And several burns

Because that’s the hand that holds things

A hand that once held a lightsaber (imaginary)

And there’s half a fingernail missing on the right thumb

Not that that matters, your wrist is consistently sprained from boards

I wish I could explain to the boy the necessity of this shit for money

But it really fails. He’s right

And honest to god I want to smack him for being so beautiful

But he’s still in here somewhere I know

I just want to run my fingers along him

And he’s hiding somewhere behind my pancreas

Little fucker

I’ll smoke him out

I’m tougher than he is

Tougher by far

He’d better watch out

I’ll crush him