Crunchy, But Good

I lay
on the table, her hands
working my back
and the lumps that form
from every day stress.

Sometimes I name them.
"Ah…that one's Georgia, the daughter.
Oh… that one's Jack, the son,
and goodness, that's got to be
the current project,
the one with the looming deadline."

"No matter," she said.
"The body needs tension.
Otherwise, it falls down to the ground,
a pile of bones and yuck."

In The Dark

We were friends and fourteen
in Taiwan—
a long way from home
and busy, missionary parents.
So we broke curfew,
climbed out windows
through bushes and iron gates
to smoke
behind a poor farmer's shack
hidden by corrugated tin,
and plywood,
and night.
We left our ashes
and our fiery adolescent confusion
in a sand pile by the door.
That night
a fire burned
the place down.
With morning light
we were caught
and punished.

My father
only wrote once
in all those years
I was away
at boarding school.
The letter
was on a blank note card
penned in his familiar
and mysterious scrawl.
It was only a few
sentences long.

“Dear Erin,” it began.
“I am disappointed in you.”
He explained:
Not for breaking rules
or ruining my body
with bad habits, no.
But for being with two boys
in the dark.

I kept it for years
as the only keepsake
I had from him,
and memorized it
word for word.