Not a Scratch on You

by Joshua Hilderbrand

[10 mg Propranolol]

The baby takes a bath on his birthday; charred & smiling through white teeth. 
Everyone burned in the street eventually settles,

      [200 mg Zoloft]

in a kitchen filled with faces. Yelling questions, patting shoulders, clinking beer bottles. Blue and red streamers lining white walls impervious to red pasta sauce splatters. Someone explodes a balloon.

                             [1 mg Xanax]

The sun reflects off silver party hats running through the backyard. Flashes.
Trigger squeeze, breathe, trigger squeeze. They sing

          [call it coma]

to the baby who doesn’t understand he is supposed to blow; supposed to
smear red handfuls of frosting all over his face.

                         [15 mg Hydroxyzine]

She points to a ribbon tied around a tree, says,
I bought this the day you left.

                                          [3 oz whiskey] 

Its edges tattered, its
Pale yellow wishes oscillating between joyful screams. 

            [the baby]

---

Joshua Hilderbrand is an Iraq war veteran and social worker. His poems have been nominated for Best of the Net Anthology and The Pushcart Prize. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming at Into the Void, As You Were: The Military Review, and The 15th Annual Sue C. Boynton Contest 2020 Winning Poems. He currently resides in the Pacific Northwest.