My poem, “Lice,” was selected for publication online at FestivalForPoetry.com. Swipe through the carousel to read the entire poem, an homage to Lice outbreaks in the public school system and the effect they can have on a family. (From my chapbook of poetry, These Are the Rooms to my Mother’s House.

LICE
It begins with an itch
just above the nape.
The seeds grow there.
White bud, tail, and bowels
twist in a full bed of hair.
The creature is microscopic,
mistaken as dust,
or the dandruff of hair,
unwashed.

Fingernails rake the bed
until the scalp aches,
scraped in spots to the skull.
Scabs pull away
with the brushing of hair,
until sore is the miserable halo,
you wear. Knowing,
you wrinkle your brow.
Sweep the mask
to the hair that drapes the brow—
the curtain of underhair—
to see the growth,
the seed planted.
He clings,
woven into the tresses like rope,
climbing leg-over-leg to nest
in the base of warmth, the neck.

If you had no choice
would you shave him down?
Instead, you buy like a force, some RID,
to wring him down wet with a tiny comb.

You strip sheets from beds,
hose the bathroom,
sterilize laundry, vacuum,
shake out the carpets,
throw pillows from house to lawn.
Your cursings baptize the louse.
He lies in the lather-white foam,
washed in the bathtub current,
basted in the acidy batter.

But is he ever gone?
For days to come,
won’t you imagine him
floating in the cream,
wriggling for his life
in your French-vanilla latte,
struggling in the pools?
And itching occurs
far after the latter,
for weeks,
even after the death
of the bastards.