The admonishment at age 6 was this: Pull your lower lip in, or an elephant will come along and step on it . My grandmother of the always clean, passing the felt-bottomed collection plate, allowed no pout. Sadness was for others with less, without silverware to eat. No picking at the peas or potatoes. My lip and lump in my throat forbidden, hidden. Stick figures populating a children’s book. Spine affixed with silver adhesive tape, a stringy makeshift mend, once belonging to my father, her most obedient son (Just swallow that ball of irritable. Good Manners Can Be Fun ) I defaced the aging pages, scribbling my crooked name sloppily in pencil, and then rooted for the tiny pachyderm in a blue star-less room Nose-trunk growing like Pinocchio caught in what he wanted to believe. That he was a real boy. That these elongated faces make visible sense when we are lonely and no one is listening. When the forest is full of wonderful screeching monkeys and rhinoceros. Thick ski