Poetry: Summer at Twelve

{Poem originally published at The Literary Nest, Winter 2020}

The shopkeeper kept silent each time

my friend and I snuck behind the far row

of books, eyes wide at The Joy of Sex.

Perhaps it was time we knew. At

twelve, we bled, could reproduce.

And we were children of the seventies;

innocence so passé. Oh, the wonders in pen

and ink! The endless bodily arrangements!

It was enough to turn adults red as poppies,

to transfix the steadiest mind. But after

the bookstore, we would eat ice cream—

bubblegum flavor, confettied with gumballs,

each fished from our mouths and saved

for later. Tiny, colorful pools of drool

collected like polka-dots on paper napkins where

each gumball sat, counted, to see

who’d scored the most that day. Then we raced

home on bikes, the road frying-pan hot.

Our Coppertone legs glistened like mirages,

flashed the unwitting invitations of angels,

goddess-bound.