The Time Around Scars

(A Michael Ondaatje poem:)


A girl whom I've not spoken to

or shared coffee with for several years

writes of an old scar.

On her wrist it sleeps, smooth and white,

the size of a leech.

I gave it to her 

brandishing a new Italian penknife.

Look, I said turning,

and blood spat onto her shirt.



My wife has scars like spread raindrops 

on knees and ankles,

she talks of broken greenhouse panes

and yet, apart from imagining red feet,

(a nymph out of Chagall)

I bring little to that scene.

We remember the time around scars,

they freeze irrelevant emotions

and divide us from present friends.

I remember this girl's face,

the widening rise of surprise.


And would she 

moving with lover or husband

conceal or flaunt it,

or keep it at her wrist

a mysterious watch.

And this scar I then remember

is a medallion of no emotion.


I would meet you now

and I would wish this scar

to have been given with

all the love 

that never occurred between us.




(One of my favorite poems in high school)