NEW POEM

(Linoleum print by EPD)

PRESENTS


The other girls are going to come back after New Year's
wearing new clothes, coats, boots with leather trim
Things they got for Christmas or at
the sales after, when their mothers still
had money to spend. Necklaces
birthstone rings, charm bracelets
The Latinas will have earrings for pierced ears
At lunch everyone will talk of stereos, records
A TV for their bedroom, a room they don't share
Family at a restaurant on Christmas Eve

The doctor's daughter wows all with a
surprise trip to Acapulco
But one grade up, the mayor's kid at recess
tells about a new car in the driveway with
a giant red bow on the landau roof
Who could give someone a car
for Christmas? How is that possible?

She lies about a typewriter. Since no one ever
comes to her house, they don't know she's had it
since summer, a second-hand her father found
in an alley and cleaned up. She shows them
a poem typed on it. They don't understand the lines
or why that counts as a gift, really. But she
doesn't fit in anyhow, and her difference
is familiar. Her brother in high school got
an electric guitar. She tosses that out, and
they laugh in relief, then go on to tales
of stealing cocktail sips on New Year's Eve.



© Maggie Jochild
23 December 2007, 11:40 a.m.

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