The Geometry of Becoming  

Art by Rashan Speller

Rashan Speller is a Philadelphia-based multidisciplinary artist exploring metaphysics, identity, and urban life through graphic design, photography, painting, and writing. 
Instagram: @Artistphilly 

Dendrochronology of Scars

Poetry by Anne Walters  

CW: Disturbing Content, Risky Behaviour

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A v-shaped scar on my cheek, 
the one I got as a baby, a nurse’s red 
fingernail slicing 
through my tissue paper skin.
Pinprick marks on my heels,
where the doctors drew blood when
the veins in my arms stopped 
giving them answers.
The doctors made scars
to keep me alive
(I started making them
to do the same).
 
Thick lines exploded on
my wrists, hips,
shoulders.
A failed math test,
my father’s death,
squabbles with friends
all etched
in the history of my skin.
Every line, another plea
to myself to make it
one more second without
taking an entire bottle of Tylenol
or pushing myself into
traffic on our county road.

Every thought hurt more than the / knife.
 
The scars tell me
I’ve managed to
white-knuckle my way through
thirty-five years
of stories only they
know the answer to.
Anne Walters (they/them) is a queer writer who lives in New Jersey. They have been published in Midway Journal, The Bitchin’ Kitsch, among others. Anne has been a nominee for the Best of the Net.
Instagram: @_breakerfall