To the person who stabbed me while I was sitting on my fire escape, Jane Rebecca Cannarella

Freckled scars

are imprints of dears or deer—

exit wounds over my body:

abstract art, spatters of color

patterned like lace and the feeling

of raised grapefruit-colored kisses

—and just as tart. I run my fingertips

over the stitched pieces held

together by hasty needlework—

a framed magic-eye

needlepoint; home decorations that greet friends’

fingers with welcoming artwork

that they can touch.

JANE-REBECCA CANNARELLA is a writer and editor living in Philadelphia. She is the editor of HOOT Review and Meow Meow Pow Pow Lit, and a former genre editor at Lunch Ticket. Jane-Rebecca is the author of Better Bones and Marrow, both published by Thirty West Publishing House, The Guessing Game published by BA Press, and Thirst and Frost forthcoming from Vegetarian Alcoholic Press.