an iowa girl’s story

by kairo

Posted to Action Poetry on 2001-09-03 16:28:00

Parent message is 9260
i was two months pregnant
parents and boy had never met,
uneasy circumstances.
my mother wore canvas tennis shoes,
my father pin striped suit,
brooks brothers tie.
his mother wore green sweats
and an ugly scowl.
it was a symphony of mourning,
grieving,
crying in unison as i held my stomache
full and chalky with tums.
i was eighteen.
he was nineteen.
my parents were aging to one hundred infront of my eyes.
as my father broke down,
loosened his redder than red tie
he said,
“living in a glass house,
give the boy a tour.”
back stair groping
after three days unseen.
i loved him more than i loved
what sat upstairs weeping over the loss of me.
day after thanksgiving
my mother and i sat hours waiting to see someone
who would remedy my “situation”
(i wasn’t the marrying type…)
as a boy from my college grasped his girlfriend’s hand
across the lobby
and waved at me.
you’re kidding me, right?
when it was all over my mother,
sweet and celebratory as she is,
took me to dairy queen
but the pills that are to ward off infection
can’t tolerate milk products of any kind.
i watched her eat.
back at school,
missed two college days of classes
due to “mental issues” the profs had been told
i rushed to his dorm room,
“i’m back…i’m….back.”
he was sitting there,
high on shrooms flying in zones unreachable
with a girl’s head on his lap.