Love’s Golden Shovel

As a child, I take my ache and we

spin around playgrounds real

fast. We trip but play cool

as if we didn’t fall, not like we

know better. Not like there are any men left

to hurt us, we think. Catholic school

priests teach us what to fear. We

start to hate our hair that lurk

-s beneath our pits, our hearts that want late

nights touching ourselves. We

love our best friend’s lips, wish they’d strike

ours. We dream of open strawberries straight

off the stem, things that look like what we

aren’t supposed to know. We sing

Katy Perry, mouths open sin

-kholes. We kiss girls. We

worry we’re women loving women but not the thin

ones we dream of. We want love that gin

-gerly holds us, what only woman can give. Spring: we

grow and scat through lovers like jazz.

May: my ache starts to disappear. June:

I miss when the two of us would we

-ather vane change clothes together. My ache die

-s so quickly it hurts. It feels too soon.