A list of my mother's lovers

a list of my mother's lovers; if we can't fix the world just try, try to make any one thing more beautiful; a revery on politics and justice


she told me, I had to wear a plaid skirt to elementary school
and got sent home the day my growth spurt dangled my knees
tantalizingly below the hem, whore girl, and I walked along the road
knee socks not quite masking the female body that was made
to torment men


when I was fourteen, she said, I fell in love with a boy 
with sandy hair and an apologetic manner, glasses, the works
we exchanged crumpled notes, sweet nothings in secret code
and eventually, made out behind the pines, off the path
winding from the cranberry bogs


at sixteen, though, there was someone else, and she grew quiet, so
childhood me dug out that old yearbook and there he is, smirking
his sexual consciousness circled in a red pen accompanied by, 
Hey Barb, it was great
getting to know you


her parents slept in separate twin beds, and indulged in sin
twice monthly, I imagine, and came down hard on her
curls were immodest, boys were the devil and soon
she had quit school and moved to boston
as a bisexual loading dock worker


she told me, my roommate was a night club dancer and I loved
watching her move and we didn't have a refrigerator but we 
fought like we cared in those snow filled streets and when 
calvin came along everything
changed


he brought her to his Alabama family, black and 
didn't the world stare, she said he taught her to cook, 
and canoe, and they wanted to have a baby, but 
he was drafted, and years later came back, 
changed


and she wanted a child 
and a home and somehow,
she said, the long and winding
found her way
to me