I have been going through poetry I wrote several years ago when I was going to school for a master’s in English (which I never finished). I’ll be posting most of them in an effort to preserve them. Because I like to hoard intellectual property just as much as physical items! Seriously, it does bother me that there are some poems that I know I wrote but of which not a trace seems to exist now. So here we go:

House of Girls

Girls languid like the melting ice cream
in bowls scattered about. Girls scratching
each others’ heads. Girls giving each
other pedicures. In the time machine house,
go back, past catty college,
past terrible teens, to the best days,
ten, eleven, twelve, when your true love
was girls, girls, girls. Perfumes, lotions,
shampoos. An image in the mirror that pleases,
backed by a happy chorus. Comparing bra
sizes. Shooting hoops. Racing for the phone.
Shiny hair and clear skin.

Outside, the sidewalk slaps them down,
and they go about tearing her down, papering
her over. Girls get paychecks. Girls have sex
in outlandish places. Girls drive for miles, alone.

Inside, under the house spell, they indulge her,
littlest of little girls. Sometimes the phone
rings frantically and no one answers,
too enamored with her.