"bleeding watercolors"

Pigtails on a Painter's pallet,
the colors swirled to blood-stained strokes,
and up and down on the seesaw she goes.
Unborn limbs tossed to the sea,
smiles cut to fit the canvas,
and up and down and up and down.
She's a twirl of cotton candy,
running barefoot in a splash of sun,
up, up, up;
a flick of a brush,
held steady, silent,
and down, down, down.
And here she runs to the seesaw,
up and down she goes,
up and down,
up,
down,
she clings,
see her go,
up,
down.
An open wound begging for salt,
and yet…
she yearns for the jump off an easel,
out of a frame,
the dizzy sugar grin,
she yearns
up,
held by a Painter
down.