NOT TO KNOW 1962

A GIRL PREPARES FOR BED THINKING OF A BOY AT SCHOOL IN 1962

Sheila prepares for bed,
undresses, removes
the day's clothes,
piece by piece
and drops them in a chair.

Naked she stands
and gazes at her naked form
in the tallboy mirror
before her older sister comes.

She wonders what John would say
if he could see
as she is now displayed?

She runs her fingers along
her buds of breasts,
imagines maybe he would
play as such, gentle,
not rough, not over much.

Her mother's voice from downstairs,
rows between the parents now.

She folds her arms about her,
as if ,when turning round
and gazing at the mirror sight,
another embraced her and not she,
as if far as one can see.  

Pubic is scant,
hairs beneath her arms
just visible as she
raises her hands
to touch her hair as if
it were John lifting there.

As if.

Her older sister
enters the room,
dark of eyes,
slit for lips,
unseeing eyes,
lowered in some
religious realm,
or convent walls
or chapel's rest.

Of John,
wonder what he does now?

Undressing like she?
Naked before a mirror
just for show,
she closes her eyes,
to imagine,
not to know.