A biker in the checkout line has cursive
on his arm: He has removed our sins as far from us

as the west is from the east. In purple ink. His skin’s
like parchment from a calf’s cleaned hide: soaked,

dried, stretched, then scraped with a crescent-
shaped knife. Treated with lime to make it accept

the writing. All my nights are like papyrus,
drenched in tears, a wash of disobedience

staining my blank ease. How craven,
wretched, wasteful I’ve been, trusting the sad

needs of flesh, endangering the small animal
of spirit. And yet, a hungry lion

on the veld will prowl elsewhere
if the wind shifts. Save my skin, dear wind.

This article appears in April 29 2019.

Leslie Williams is the author of Even the Dark, winner of the Crab Orchard Series in Poetry Open Competition (forthcoming in October, 2019). Her first collection, Success of the Seed Plants, won the Bellday Prize. She lives near Boston with her family.