How many years have you lived in this body and how
do you still know it's yours?

Even though i'm younger
than all the trees around my house
i still feel it my right to pick
their leaves-- peel off
the veins like string cheese 
from lunch boxes left out in 
the heat of a station wagon. 
Even though i'm younger
than any river rock that
has used the palm of my
hand as park bench i still toss
the roundest pebbles into the creek like
stale dinner rolls
the week after Christmas Eve 
when no one wants to pretend
it's still a holiday-- i like to think
i'm tall sometimes and sometimes
i forget that i'm the kind of creature
who could slip off a tree branch 
and close myself like the
heavy thud of a text book 
on the linoleum floor of my 
high school lunch room. 
i can't count the rings imprinted
in pirouettes around and around my waist
to tell you how old i am anymore
but i can tell you i can count
my ribs and the thin grins of
scars on my hips. 
i can count my eye lashes
if i work up the patience
and i can count the sinews
of leaf veins-- extracted 
to replace my own-- 
i know it is mine because
each ring tastes like the rim
of a tea cup or a coffee mug
i know it is mine
because i've used it to sew
soy beans-- taken the hoe
across my forearms--
i always plant too early 
in March--
i was never good with plants--
they always die or fall
out windows.
i like where i live though--
i like maple leaf veins 
of my thighs and the
stretch marks that resemble
the lines God sketched on
watermelons.
it has taken a number of moon blinks
but i can tell you today that 
i do know that these limbs
are at least mine today, this morning--
i am something of this body--
and maybe i have dominion over
the veins of trees 
and the potato stomachs of the river rocks
because i had been that body too--
but we will save my dissection for another 
day-- and for today i will say
that someone knows how long
i have lived in this body
and that they will count my
pirouettes when it's time
to pass this body to someone else.