She grins at me. “That’s a ton
of baked goods. We need more tables.”
I sip my O. J. “But why are we getting donations?
I thought it was just us baking.”
Ashlyn looks at me kindly,
like a grandmother
telling a toddler why rain falls.
“Gretchen, this is bigger than us.
It’s bigger than The Foodies, even
this school.” She grins. “Trust me.
We need more tables.”
Something’s Up
By P. E., almost the whole cooking club — and some people I don’t even recognize — have come up to offer condolences and smile secret smiles about “three o’clock.”
No one will tell me what this means. I feel blindfolded.
And it’s not really a secret. Mr. Cunningham knows. The grad class knows (they smile at me too, but in a sad, I’m-glad-it’s-you-and-not-me way).
Ms Long knows. She hugged me in the hall. People saw. I didn’t care. I hugged her back.
We’re Out in the Rain
playing something
that might resemble
field hockey. Mud
finds its way
into my socks, shorts,
ears and nose.
I manage to hit the ball
to someone who can score,
and then notice
Shay and Nemiah
talking behind the fence
at the edge of the field.
They look at me,
talk some more.
Shay shakes her head
and walks away. Nemiah
stands there for a second,
watching me
watch her.
She looks so small, so kidlike.
Someone yells behind me.
I run after the ball as it passes.
When I look back,
she’s gone.
Cooking Club, 3:00 P.M.
Ms Long, little Ms Long
with horse teeth and perching, bird body
takes the floor. Her voice carries
around the room like she’s got
a microphone.
The money from the bake sale
will go into a chemistry scholarship
in James’s name.
She tells us how proud she is
of everyone, who has been working
on this for days.
Everyone looks so excited — more excited
than you’d think they would look
to be selling baked goods
for a dead boy’s scholarship.
I glance at Ashlyn, who’s beaming.
Suddenly I’m seeing her
from a different angle. Light is hitting her
in exactly the right places.
Insight
I’m treated to a welcome committee when I get home late
from organizing baked goods — Layla, Mum and Dad are setting the table, tossing salad, pulling something spicy out of the oven.
“Gretchen, we want to say —”
My mother is interrupted by Layla’s bulldozing me against the wall.
“You’re so talented! I showed my class what you did.”
“You showed what?” I ask.
“The posters! Mum and Dad got copies from Ms Long and they printed some.”
“You printed some?” I watch my parents’ faces go from proud to nervous to bashful.
Return
My phone is beside my head — I’ve been
expecting Ashlyn to call in a tizzy
about missing cream puffs —
and it rings me out of dreamless sleep.
His voice is low and scratchy.
I bolt awake. “Where are you?
Are you okay?”
There’s music playing in the background.
“Look, I’m sorry for not calling,” he says.
“I was an idiot when you were here.”
He clears his throat. “I’ve really missed you.”
We sit in silence, attached
by the phone, and even though I’m not the same
and he’s not the same
and this conversation is awkward,
I miss him too.
“I need to see you,” he says.
“Tomorrow’s the Spring Fair.”
“And you can’t get away?”
I start to explain, but stop.
He clears his throat. “Can you meet me
in the morning? Just for a minute. I’ll pick you up.”
Something crunches on his end —
gravel underfoot.
Dean Is Washed Out
like I’ve never seen him. Like a homeless ghost. His skin is grey and dry. His hair is greasy and flat against his head. He smiles at me from behind the wheel in a faintly Dean way. But I still wonder if it’s actually him or if I’m being abducted by his alter ego — the guy who spat those terrible words at me in his apartment.
He reaches to hug me and at least he smells like him.
I ease back into the warm seat. The heater blows air into my face.
“You look good,” he says as he pulls onto the street. “It feels like a year.”
“Ten days can be a year,” I say, stare out the window, watch the neighbourhood go by.
We Stop at Cleveland Dam Park
which isn’t far from my house,
but far enough to make me feel
like I couldn’t just run home.
We walk along the causeway
and look down at the loud water
spilling foam into the river below.
The mist that rises cuts through
my jacket. Dean puts his arm around me.
I wish we could just be this couple
looking at the water, wondering where
it came from. But we’re both
in different worlds —
even though we touch, it’s like
we’re doing it from a distance.
Love?
We stand above the roar, letting the mist
drench our hair and the collars of our shirts
until we turn into trees. Our feet become roots
that burrow under the concrete and find soil
to eat and water to drink. We are entwined.
We are knotted trunks and reaching branches.
Dean pulls away first. He starts to tell me
how beautiful I am, but I’m hearing it
with different ears. Like the compliment
is something he’s throwing at me.
I ask about the past few days, where he’s been.
He closes his eyes. The tiny blue veins
on his lids pop out against his white-grey skin.
“I’ve been messed up. Just out of it.”
I blink at him. “What does that mean?”
He shrugs, says, “I don’t know.”
But I know, then, as his hands shake a little
and his face twitches. He’s high
or coming down, or something equally terrible.
There’s nothing about him
I recognize.
But Still
I ask him to come
to the Spring Fair.
I reach for his cold hand
and tell him what the school,
the community, is doing
for James.
At the name
he freezes, locks his jaw.
I squeeze tighter,
but his hands are limp,
pulling away.
“I can’t. I can’t.”
He swallows the rest
of the words.
“Come on,” I say.
“Your aunt will be there.”
At this he snatches
his hands away.
I step forward. “But why not?”
Because
“I can’t stand to see
them!” he shouts, red
in the w
hites of his eyes.
“Aunt Miriam
crying by the coffin —
his coffin —
a goddamn wooden box!
I can’t do it.”
He scrunches his face up,
pats his pockets
like he’s looking
for something, then swears.
“I can’t do it again.”
“Wait — you were at the funeral?” I ask.
He looks so, so angry,
tear-someone’s-head-off angry.
“Just for a minute, from outside.
It was so —”
He makes an animal sound,
a gut-wrenching,
dying sound
that goes over the edge,
roars with the foamy water
crashing into the canyon.
Haiku: For Dean
Boy-man, you try hard
to escape the sadness, but
it will bury you.
Haiku: Chocolate Cake
Chunks eaten with milk,
no plate or fork, just family
mouths, hands reaching in
It Begins
School, Saturday morning: laden with boxes, already dusted in sugar, I’m amazed to see how many people are waiting.
It’s not just a crowd. It’s a small concert-worth. Students and parents and teachers and people who work at the grocery store and the hardware store and the gas station. They stand outside, line the halls and wander about, chatting.
“Gretchen!” Ashlyn literally runs into me. “Thank god you’re here!”
“This is a madhouse!” I shout, putting my boxes down on the counter.
“We made some calls, but your posters have gone viral!” she screeches.
“I didn’t put the page online with the posters,” I yell over the din. “Did you?”
She shakes her head and shrugs. “Whoever did is a genius.”
I’ve never seen her look so happy and so insane.
“How will we sell all this stuff?” I ask.
She just laughs. It’s not about selling anymore. It’s the principle.
Ms Long walks in grinning, weighed down with doughnuts. We rush over before they topple.
The Fair
is on the playing field behind the school,
and with all the tables and booths and people,
you wouldn’t think it was our field at all:
music playing from speakers somewhere,
the smell of popcorn, the slosh-splash of grads filling
a pool that will hold remote-controlled boat races.
The May air is warm, finally, and I can smell
flowers — probably because there’s a stall selling
gardenware. I stand in the middle of all the chaos —
students, parents, teachers milling around me —
and just exist.
Everything Goes
not to plan, but that’s okay because our plan
did not include fifty tonnes of baked good
donations this morning, or all the extra people
who’ve shown up to help.
Random people come up to me and say how
cool this is and that they like my posters.
Even Drama Queens with embryonic dogs in tow:
“We’re totally going to buy a fruit tart later,
Gretchen,” they giggle. “Are they low fat?”
I remind myself that this is more than
I could have hoped for — people who would have
ignored me before are saying they like
the posters, that they are sorry about James.
I can’t magic high school into a place
where we all hold hands and get along.
James couldn’t do it either,
even with his diagrams and theories.
But things aren’t hopeless.
Suddenly
It’s afternoon and I’ve been at the baking table for three hours.
Ms Long arrives, snags a brownie and squeezes my arm. “Nice shirt,” she says. “Do I know who made it?”
I nod, looking down at the PoEM t-shirt James made me.
“This is actually perfect,” Ms Long says. “I’m going to announce the scholarship in a few minutes. Mrs. Tarden is here —” she points and I see her walking toward us, her face tired but relaxed.
I cringe as Garth/Thor throws a date bar at some other kid’s head. It hits the cash box and things dissolve from there.
“And I was hoping you could say a few words,” Ms Long is saying. “In fact, it would be great if you could read a poem.”
I choke on air. “What?”
“You’ve written some very eloquent poems about James. I just thought it might be fitting to read one here.”
Now I know she’s lost it. Great — the one person I thought I could count on.
“You wrote poetry about James?”
I swing around so fast I almost hit Mrs. Tarden, who’s snuck up behind me and has a terribly hopeful look on her face.
She Asks Me to Read a Poem
and that is the worst thing, because I can’t say no —
it’s his mother, the woman
who smells like cinnamon and who knows
I understood her son,
and she knows I will say yes,
even if I say it by blushing and stammering.
This is the craziest thing
I have ever done — next to putting up lost posters
for a dead boy.
This isn’t a poetry reading venue
or even a slam.
There can’t be a crowd
more hostile to random acts of poetry.
Dizzy/Hyperventilating
I sit behind the baking table as Ms Long tells everyone that there will be an announcement.
And an impromptu poetry reading — why doesn’t she say that? Maybe she’s afraid that would send people running in the other direction. She’d be right. I lower my head between my knees.
There’s a tap on my shoulder. Garth/Thor breathes honey doughnut breath into my ear. “Gretchen, on behalf of The Foodies, and also my buddies in the D&D club, we want to say we think you did a really kick-ass thing.”
I turn and find about ten of the cooking club members, including a weeping Ashlyn, standing there.
“A lot of us acted like judgemental jerks. James was clearly a cool guy. We have to live with our, uh, jerkiness.” Garth/Thor looks helplessly at the others. “But we’re all really glad we can be here. We think this is a pretty cool way to have a memorial service.”
Ms Long waves me to get up. She must have magical abilities because a crowd has gathered. A sizeable one.
Looking into Hell
beside Ms Long,
who stands (Ms Long! Standing!)
in front of the baking tables.
Then she is speaking
about the scholarship
and blah blah blah
and soon it will be
my turn to form words,
and Mrs. Tarden is there,
smiling at us,
and my parents, Layla, waiting.
My eyes lock, without my permission,
onto the swim team congregation
(where did they come from?).
Shay stands in front, giggling.
She pokes a guy behind her,
who grabs her waist. Nemiah’s dark head
peeks out between various broad torsos.
Something Slips
into my hand —
a piece of paper,
as Ms Long steps back,
urging me forward,
even though I’m too stunned
to look anywhere but at my shoes.
Until this moment
it hasn’t occurred to me
that I didn’t bring any poetry with me.
There’s no time to think about
where the paper came from
because she’s whispering,
“Forget they’re here.
Read it to James.”
Where’s Shakespeare?!
someone yells from the back of the crowd.
Others giggle. Feet shuffle.
Mumble mumble.
Oh my god.
Someone makes another joke
and Shay explodes in braying laughter —
now that I think about it,
she’s always sounded like a donkey.
But the crowd
doesn’t laugh with her.
Someone mutters shut up, Shay —
I’m shocked to see it’s a lacrosse guy,
sneering at her in a way usually reserved
for the much less popular.
Someone else grabs her by the waist,
yanks her shrieking body
off the ground.
Throws her over his shoulder.
Her skinny butt wriggles
in the air, her boots kicking,
until she disappears
behind the crowd — who clap,
then cheer, then
stare at me.
Oh, right.
I’m on.
In My Hand
is a poem — my poem.
Until this second I had no idea
it would be the right thing
to read here, but it is.
No words I could have thought up
would be as good or as true.
Everything else would get stuck
in my mouth
like peanut butter.
These words are strong and black
on the page.
If I’m a poetry geek,
wearing it on my t-shirt for all to witness,
then so be it.
Intersections
Four corners, four directions,
where we stop and wait and go
and wait,
take turns deciding the way.
Last night you stood in the middle,
invisible to the cars
that drove through you,
around you.
I watched from one side
as you watched me.
You said nothing, your hands