Scars...

Scars

I have a small scar on my shoulder

It's raised. Round. Puffy. 

There are smaller scars all around it.

It looks like a little pale spider.

Once it was a freckle.

Cute. Brown. Small.
Then it grew. Darkened.
Changed.

The doctor looked at it.
"This has to go."

I thought he would scrape it off. 

Just take the once freckle away.

But he said,

"It has roots.

Like a tooth or a tree.

We have to get it all."

And so he cut it out.
Deep and round.
I saw the layers of my arm.
Skin, fat, down to the edge of the muscle.

Then it filled with blood.
He closed the hole.
Stitched it up.
Sent me away.

The results came back later.

The center was deadly.
But the edges were clean.
He got it all out.

But if I had ignored it?
Let it continue to grow?

The roots would have gone deeper.
The bite would have been worse.

Now though I have a scar.
Small. Raised. Round. Puffy.

Fuller than the spot that used to be there.
And most of all safe.

Poisoned roots.
Teeth that bite.
Cut out.
Gone.

I wonder if there is a space
Left in my heart
That looks like a puffy spider
That no longer bites.