Today's poem is by Diamond Forde

When I Was Straight
       

The van mumbled in rush hour, a cemetery yawning gray teeth across the hillside to our right. "Hold your breath," the birthday girl said, & all five girls 'cept me clap shut, hands smacking their happy mouths, matching bracelets nibbling red marks in their cheeks

& it wasn't because I couldn't afford a bracelet. & it wasn't because this was my first sleepover (though it was, twelve & never spent a night not home)

or that when I entered the birthday girl's home I stumbled on stairs that went forever, stiffened hallways, a white couch, a stand mixer, one lilac room all hers—the birthday girl—who made us play celebrities so I stilted into Ashanti (because her songs carried me through all my imagined heartaches—the first, that none of you knew her name—)

& it wasn't because there was a girl playing Justin who smelled like soap & smiled when she flicked bangs from her brunette eyes (I sighed, leaning my head into the basket of her thighs when we claimed a calm minute, hoping my heartbeat didn't clang its bell)

but because the birthday girl was Britney & each time their hands fluttered like dizzy birds to meet, I swallowed honey, spoke a quiet sweet enough to drown. What did I know about myself that wasn't a key in the wrong lock? This desire, unaffordable—the dusty pocketbook of my heart clamped shut.

Copyright © 2025 Diamond Forde All rights reserved
from When I Was Straight: A Tribute to Maureen Seaton
Small Harbor Publishing
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission