Rachel Guido deVries is a poet and fiction writer. Her most recent book is a collection of poems, HOW TO SING TO A DAGO (Guernica Editions, 1996), and a collection of poems for children, EAR WAX AND HOCKEY STICKS, appeared in 1995. Awards for her writing include a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Fiction, and a New York State Council on the Arts Writer in Residence Award. Formerly director of the Feminist Women's Writing Workshops, and of the Women's Writers' Center, she currently directs the Community Writers' Project's Youth Project, is a visiting poet in area public schools, and teaches creative writing at the Humanistics Studies Center of Syracuse University.
Ear Wax

	What color is your ear wax?
	Mine is pearly pink.
	I use it every morning
	to plug up my leaky sink.

	Once a week I roll it up
	into a little sticky wad
	I pretend it is pink bubble gum
	and I give it to a friend.

	I really never do that,
	but I've thought of it once or twice
	especially if my friend
	hasn't treated me too nice.
	
	I know someone whose ear wax
	is the color of the sky.
	If that sounds strange, remember:
	this is a friend who never cries.

	All of this kid's tear drops
	were like ocean waves all blue
	They sailed into his ear canal,
	and now his ear wax is blue too.

	So, what color is your ear wax?
	Stop and take a peek
	You might have a rainbow in your ear
	or a bright green rushing creek.