They came with small notepads taking my words
down in pen; night became morning.  A car
to the cinderblock room chipping green, dirty blue. 
A woman behind a metal desk not impressed
by my snot or the welts around my wrists;
I spoke, she wrote.  I inked my initials
at the bottom right corner.  Now it was day. 
The driver had a title I’ve since forgotten, he asked
for the story again, and once we arrived
at the apartment:  “Walk me through” and I did what I could. 
I packed a bag, a change of clothes, and drove off
with Detective Linda in a floral skirt,
a lanyard swung – a pendulum
across her chest. We took a back door to the ER. 
They knew we were coming.  I told
a nurse, and then a doctor.  I told a volunteer. 
Changed clothes, left the sleep things
in a paper grocery bag to be inspected, swabbed. 
Chose noses and eyebrows out of old mug shots,
created someone I almost recognized:
a white girl’s vision of that man.
They told me to call my mother.  I did.  I told
and told.  And the telling begat telling and
coiled like a snake eating its own tail.
The telling starts where it stopped,
and with my notepad, my words
a snaky pen hissing to forget.
Tell the white space between
numbers, letters, and punctuation
of name, case number,
DOB, SSN, address.
Fill in the hollow
blanks.  Answer the
questions no one
even asked.