Age 13 sitting on the ground
in the backyard, the world summer soft
around me, running my flat hand
over the grass thinking in some unformed
way of my virgin purity, the hard pews
of church never far from my mind.
If it’s admired as beautiful,
it gets messed up and so its beauty
destroys it.  My aunt looking
down from the porch,
what are you doing?
Of course I had no words to explain.