I say.
She sniffs
Nose in the air
A taste of snarky Kayli.
Don’t sweetie, please
I try.
Is it Parker?
Is he pressuring you?
No pressure
No problem
None of your business.
She pockets the condoms
And promises
You tell, I tell.
And Samir will suffer
Worse than us.
Once, under
The crocheted blanket,
We swore
No man could
Come between us.
Once we vowed
It was me and her
Against Mom and Dad.
We were sisters in arms
United, blood-bound
Virgin warriors
Once.
PASTELS
I draw Kayli’s pale, thin hand
Chipped pink nail polish and a
Fistful of stolen condoms.
In pretty pastels,
Like a greeting card you would
Give to your grandmother.
EUPHEMISTICALLY SPEAKING
I’m on Facebook when David’s message pings
Do we need to talk, he writes
About the thing?
“The thing” where I kissed him on the steps
Two weeks have gone by already
Two weeks where we’ve run past each other
At school and barely stopped
To say hello.
Are we still friends, he writes
Or are we more?
I can’t pretend like
Nothing happened.
Infuriatingly
My eyes fill up with tears
I’m supposed to be stronger than this
Colder, but instead I burn
Blushing with shame
Though there’s no one around
To see it.
DISCRETION
I sniff back the tears
And write
“The thing?”
I like you.
What are you thinking?
Boyfriend/girlfriend?
Does it have to be public?
I’m not ashamed or anything.
I’ve just had enough of gossip.
A long time passes
With me choking
On my lies
Before David writes back
I’ll see you at school.
411
It’s not hard to find him
Ashraf combined with Samir’s last name
And there’s only one in New York.
And it’s not hard to locate him
On Facebook, on Twitter, he even has a blog
With his graphic-design portfolio.
It’s slightly hard to decide
The best way to contact him
Email, tweet, Facebook, comment on his blog?
It’s hardest to know what to write
Hello, Ashraf, my name is Raphaelle
I’m secretly dating your brother Samir.
He misses you.
INSUFFICIENT
“Secretly dating”
Seems too small and innocent
For all that we are.
Chapter Five
Unruly
DEFORESTATION
Apparently, every second
An area the size of
Two football fields
Is deforested.
That’s horrible, of course
But when you think about it
Quite an achievement
Of man taming nature.
It’s with this in mind
That I face the terror
Of having my bikini line pruned
And torn out by the roots
Like an unruly garden hedge.
I figure
If those Brazilians
Can cut down the Amazon
They can handle pretty much anything.
CLUELESS
My limping
Bowlegged return
Is met by Dad
And just-baked cookies.
Like he knows
Chocolate is the cure
For humiliation
And tender red skin.
What did you do today?
He asks in a kind of
Mindless parental mantra.
I wonder
If he really wants an answer
If asking satisfies
Some fatherly need
Or if he’s waiting for me
To say something like
“I had most of the hair removed
Painfully
From my private parts.
What did YOU do?”
But I shove cookies in my mouth
And say, Shopping.
NUCLEAR TESTING
Then there is the matter
Of choosing a bikini.
Kayli has about a dozen
Each one
Tinier
Than
The
Last.
Why don’t I just go nude?
That would cause a scene
Wouldn’t be the first time
Kayli says, eyeing me
Assessing me
Narrow-eyed.
My flowered
Ample bottom
Overflows
My tidy boobs
Cower helplessly
Swathed in
Purple.
Can’t I wear the WonderBra?
That gave me cleavage.
That’s underwear, Ra
Is it a lingerie car wash?
We’d probably
Make more money
If it was.
Lingerie is hardly appropriate
Kayli pencils A P P R O P R I A T E
On her homework
And then
Sexy lingerie is not appropriate for teenage girls.
That’s a vocabulary word
She says.
NOT QUITE IRISH TWINS
She:
Has golden light in her hair
Ocean-bright eyes
Dancer grace and athlete strength
Skin like butter
A pouting shape
Plentiful with promise.
I:
Have wiry mud waves
Storm-cloud eyes
Bones and butt and bloat
All in the wrong places
Skin like sifted flour
Dotted with spice.
She:
Can talk to anyone
And say nothing.
I:
Open my mouth
And obnoxious pours out.
She:
Was born silently in a warm bath.
I:
Was torn screaming into the world.
REFLECTION
My reflection glares
Flinging words
I try not to use.
Fat
Pale
Puffy
Disproportionate
Like I’m a badly executed
Painting.
My body
Swells
Distorts.
Once the me in the mirror
Was my golden temple
A swift and sturdy chariot.
Now she’s becoming
My unwieldy burden
A suit of iron.
A twisted bitter sister
On whom bikinis
Shrink and choke.
She pushes me away
Holding me at arm’s length
In her judgmental eye.
BROKEN MIRROR
And then
I want
To wrap
My naked
Body around
Samir’s and
Let his
Ecstasy rebuild
The wholeness
Of me.
NEW EARTH
Our spring cleaning is a bit late
Because summer has fallen unexpectedly
Full-grown and armored
Into our unprepared laps.
Mom whistles as she rakes away
The last of the slush-mashed leaves
Now fragile, dry and cracked
By the relentless prairie sun.
Dad shreds papers and notes
Out-of-date progress reports
He won’t need or prefers to forget
For the summer term.
Kayli piles unwanted clothes
And shoes on my stairs
Like her rejects, some unworn
Are good enough for me.
I sweat on my unmade bed
Choosing artwork from grade eleven
To add to my walls
Or discard.
The hand collection has grown
And is beginning to look
Peculiar, menacing even
Like an encroaching army.
The mandalas soothe me with their symmetry
But the portraits prickle my conscience
Sarah, I called Puffy and sketched
Fatter than she is.
Sarah and I might have been friends
In other circumstances
If I had achieved what I set out to do
Instead of what really happened.
How somehow I
Turned Genie against her
Tore them apart without even trying
Broke their BFF bond by being me.
My face gets hot.
The slant-ceilinged room is an oven
Even with the mudroom door open
Because heat rises and has nowhere to go.
SOIREE
They arrive in pairs
Or groups
Languid, drowsy-eyed
Arms slung over shoulders
Smelling mildly of skunk
And beer.
They call Dad “Drew” or “Boss”
And smoke in the driveway.
If they’re graduates
Why are they still students?
Kayli asks.
She understands how it works
Just doesn’t know why anyone
Would CHOOSE more school.
Two bearded boys slip out
Barefoot across the dewy yard
Fragrant tendrils of smoke
Curl above the back fence.
Want some?
Says one
When I join them
In the lane.
How old are you?
Says the other
As I puff
Inexpertly.
I would tell him
Or lie
I’m getting good at that
But I don’t care
For the look on his face.
NIGHTTIME STROLL: PART ONE
Supposedly, it’s safe
To walk at night
So I walk away
From the stoned
Graduate students.
Stay on the well-lit
Busy roads
Walk on the sidewalk
Squinting in the headlights
Trailing my hands
In the chain-link
Around the baseball field.
A shadow moves
Near first base
At first I think it’s a child
But as it runs into the trees
I see its tail flick gray
Wait! I cry
As though a coyote
Would listen to me.
I try a tentative howl
Raising my face to the moon
My lungs sing and sear
And I run out of breath
But no one answers.
NIGHTTIME STROLL: PART TWO
David sniffs
Suspiciously
When I appear
Goose-bumped
And red-eyed
In his driveway.
You smell like weed
He says.
His brother, Michael
A taller, older lookalike
Dribbles a basketball
Like he doesn’t care
About anything.
Dude, chill, he says
And grins at me
Where’s the party?
My dad’s students
Postgrads
Two of them
Were creeping me out
So I bailed.
It’s not really true
They were harmless stoners
Historians in progress
How dangerous could they be?
But David softens
You walked here?
Do your parents know
Where you are?
No less than usual
I think.
CHIVALRY
And he walks me home
Because it’s late
And he asks
For permission
Before giving me
A timid kiss
And he doesn’t mention
I must taste of smoke
As we stand
Nose to nose.
And when the two stoners
Appear on the porch
And say, Whoa
You lucky bastard
David tells them
Laughing
To fuck off.
And I know
Later, maybe tomorrow
He’ll ask me about it
And want to talk
About “us”
And I appreciate
That he knows
I’m too wasted
And tired
To discuss it now.
And I watch him
Amble away
Hands in pockets
Into the dark street
And I want so badly
To call him back
To call it all off
This selfish game
Right now.
BY THE WAY
Mouth fuzzy
Feeling like
Is lying next to me
I (we) watch the moon
Traverse the skylight
And close my (our) eyes
Against the clawing
Accusing hands
Floating on a bed
Of paranoia.
So much
For not using
Drugs.
PLAYDATE
Samir brings his nephew
Jibreel, the angel
Who is nearly five months old.
You would never know
His shaky start to life.
I think of his tiny limbs
His bird’s chest
Laced with tape and tubes.
Now he’s round and rosy
Though still as bald as my
Newly waxed thighs.
Nina brings Aidan
Who emerged
More than fully cooked
Two weeks late, says Nina
They had to induce.
He’s twice Jibreel’s size
And crawling.
Marika and I sit on the patio
And watch the chaotic result.
Aidan squeezes Jibreel’s fat foot
A little too hard.
Jibreel squeaks, kicks out
And Aidan cops it in the chin.
He cries until Jibreel farts
So loud I think they must hear it
On the Space Station.
Then they both laugh
Until they fall over.
NAP TIME
After Nina and Marika go
While Jibreel naps in his car seat
On the kitchen table
Samir slides his hand
Under my summer dress
And his fingers linger
On the surprising smoothness.
Can I look?
He asks
We slip behind the pantry door
Wow, he sa
ys
Admiring my new landscape
A neat and trim and tiny strip
You should take another picture
Like a before and after
Did you do this for me?
I could lie
And say yes
But do I really want him to think
I’m that kind of girl?
Then again
Is it better to be
The kind of girl
Who would
frolic practically naked
In front of strangers
For money?
PREDICTABLE
So I tell the truth
Experimentally
Like free-diving into open space.
Samir stares at me
His face unreadable
I watch him take two careful breaths.
Tell me you’re kidding
He says, smoothing my dress down
And stepping into the kitchen.
And when I don’t
He says something
I didn’t realize I expected him to say.
What if I don’t want you to?
He bites it back
But some things can never be unsaid.
He waits
As though he knows
The next words out of my mouth.
You don’t own me
You don’t control me
You can’t tell me what to do with my body.
Jibreel coos
On the table
And saves us from ourselves, for now.
THERE IS NO ESCAPE
Yes, Ella
It has to be
A bikini
Otherwise it would be
A “Skanky Droopy
One-Piece Car Wash.”
SECOND OPINION
David’s only comment
About the car wash
Is that I should have fun
And remember
To wear sunscreen.
OASIS
Are you excited about summer?
Marika talks of nothing else
She has big plans for the two of you.
She knows I can’t drive the van, right?
Marika loves taking the bus
And they all have ramps now
You’ll be fine.
I’d like to do some art with her.
That would be great
You’d think she’d be sick of art
But she adores it.
I think she’ll probably teach me things.
I wouldn’t be surprised
She’s studied all the techniques
Right now she’s into Fauvism.
That suits me.
I’m quite wild myself.
CAFETERIALISM
I’m late for lunch
Because I fall into one of those
Moments where you just stare
Into your locker wondering
What is the meaning of it all?