Dinner’s destroyed
and the smoke alarm
screams its plastic
head off. Teddy’s face
is emergency-red,
tears flooding his cheeks.
Beep beep bye bye, he pleads,
pointing at the smoke alarm,
which I silence by beating
with a towel, but Teddy’s
still hysterical even though
every last beep has died.
For weeks, Teddy points
to every smoke alarm
in our house, asks Beep beep
bye bye? And I brush his hair
to one side and say The beep beep
did go bye bye.
He asks so often
that in my nightmares, fire trucks
swing around street corners,
storm up our driveway.
Beep beep bye bye, as though
beeps course through his veins,
like his heart is pumping
alarms, and if I could, I’d make
every beep go bye, for good.
But there are wounds
that even a mother can’t mend.
Today he says beep beep bye bye
while pouncing in a puddle, or chomping
on Cheerios, or even at the beach
with a silly salt water smile.
Is this what time does? Sweeps up
our beeps until our blood
rings melodies. Tell me,
is this why we don’t explode
from years and years
of stings—
because somehow
our skin stays on.
