Flame or Concealer? after Jane Huffman When I speak it is like I am boarding a plane. I am bored so I speak what I like. I am like in the ear to a mite on a cat. I'm a mite when I speak so he strikes. When he strikes it is like I am boarding a flame. When he strikes I see fear in the board. It is plain. When the furious board is aflame it is plain that my seat and my ears are in pain. Don't complain. Or he'll strike with the board yet again. Do not speak of your fear or your shame. When I fear it is like I'm a speck. I'm a fleck on a speck on a mite on a cat and the cat is aflame. And the flame is aflame. And the flame is a sign of my shame. I'm in pain. I complain. When complaining of pain I hide under the ear of the cat. But the cat is an ear with a might born of fear. So the cat with a board that's a knife in the hand licks a strike deadeye flat on the flat of my seat. And my hands board my ears. And my ears loose a cry like a blaze and a furious cat. When I scream from the strikes and the fear and the board it is clear I am dead on my feet. With my hands knifed like licks to my seat. Like a piercing alive. When he pierces my hide with the board and his fears in his hands I can now understand. He's a man. He's a man with a kid in his eyes and a kid in his gut like a birth -mark ablaze. Like a scream deep inside born of shame. When he strikes with the flame of a scream in his eyes it is now that I leap and I strike. It is now that my heart is a knife. That my hands have a blaze in their eyes. It is now I'm alive and the kid that's inside sees the kid in that man and says hi. And we hug and lock hands and we fly.