In/Out. My not being born in
this house keeps guilt away: not leaving
in the first place, I've always entered
one time more
than I left. My back's closed door
my kids make faces behind,
stab in —

no bloodshed in paternal absentee,

though stories of burned children
leave my wife scared how small
coordinating hands might fill
with matches and repetitions,
air and flammables. Kitty,

there are years of innocence,
health ahead in the youth of our daughter,
no obscenity in her
skin — that skirt letting out its own hem,
no hiking up the bone