Her Name is Rose

With a boil the size of an egg

protruding from her right hip,

she knows what I must do,

and to stall me has locked herself

inside the bathroom, bargaining

for a way out.

But it’s too late: I’ve seen

the oozing wounds stopped up with bits

of toilet paper and tape, the scarified

pockets that crater the surface

of her arms, buttocks, thighs.

A mean fix torched her last vein

years ago, and she’s been banging the dope

ever since, puncturing her body

like a juju doll. She wants to kick,

but not now.

I’m not gonna lie to you, she says

in a velvet voice. I already know what she’s after:

something stronger than local, a few Percocet, a shot of Demerol

before she’ll let me begin.

All I can tell you is, when the abscess finally drains

the odor is so foul it’s evil.

And I’m not sure, driving home

later that night, still smelling the pallid citrus,

whether it’s merely hallucination, the way

her memory inhabits me; or if being

in that same room, inhaling

that same air, made some of her

part of me.

And whose veins

are these, beginning to twitch?

Copyright Credit: Peter Pereira, "Her Name is Rose" from Saying the World (Copper Canyon Press, 2003).www.coppercanyonpress.org

Source: Saying the World (Copper Canyon Press, 2003)