My son is using a new razor
with clumsy hands.
Grooming himself as a grownup for the first time,
he spreads his elbows wide, as in a ritual,
very fastidiously, not looking sideways.
From below his temple a smear of blood
as big as a bird’s tongue keeps flowing,
no matter how often he wipes it off,
and he looks a little afraid.
what is hurt in him, I wonder.
His naked back is moistened, shining bright
like a tree with its bark peeled off.
Although he doesn’t seem to hear them,
birds are singing loud in unison
around the young tree trunks.
He doesn’t seem to see it,
but the sea is rolling in the mirror.
~ translated by Naoshi Koriyama and Edward Leuders, from What
Have You Lost, edited by Naomi Shihab Nye, (HarperCollins, 1999)
