For the First Girl I Loved
I lived across the street—across two streets.
The cemetery lay behind you, a field of stories
stretched behind a thin row of trees: there
this silence would mean a louder silence,
the sinking of stones, roots tracing their fists,
knuckling the soil. Someone could hover,
talk seemingly to no one—words meant
for someone else. You loved stories of
the past—pioneer girls doing the right thing
in flower nightgowns, a sister saved, a white lie
righted, and you always fell asleep to
whatever hands I whispered were reaching
through the window, the lie you never needed
to forgive. In the morning, you made instruments
for whatever surgery I imagined—a doll’s arm
scratched my stomach; a plastic fork
raked my shoulder, then spread salves.
Your fingers trailed the soft fold
of my elbow—skin and head
tingling, and then, a stillness
so unexpected I begged you not to stop.
And when the V of your collar dipped low,
the pink tip of your scar appeared
swollen, raised. I willed myself
not to finger the ridge
stitching your cracked chest shut.
*
Helena Mesa is the author of Where Land Is Indistinguishable from Sea (forthcoming from Terrapin books) and Horse Dance Underwater, and is an editor for Mentor & Muse: Essays from Poets to Poets. She lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
