The Itch

by Crystal Bixby
(Maryland)

They come in the summer.

Those flying masses

They come to use small pieces of you.

The visible pieces

They bite and steel your tenderness,

taking from you nourishment for themselves.

You want to itch.

You want to attend to the chemical they've created inside you.

that sensation that is so hard to ignore,

Pleading, and screaming at you like a hungry cat

So you scratch the itch.

Now it's too f'n late.

You've given the itch your scratch.

And most of the creatures die away in the winter

Leaving you bitter,

with an infectious pondering

and a confused notion of men.