“That dress is too tight”, says her mother for the second time that night. But the girl knows it’s just right.
Likes how it bites into the wrong places;
Rudely sucks and pushes at the bust, fierce lace ties trussing her up. An overfilled cup. Rose bursting to bloom from bud.
Her father says “Don’t be too long.”
But she’s already gone, his words swallowed by cicada song.
She slips into the dusk air heavy with pine and fig musk.
And this is where she begins, the snake who must shed its old skin. Picking up pace she feels her pulse race at the memory of that day
When the summer boy kissed her the first time in the boat house
While her parents dined on the beach
Enchanted by the calamari and cheap wine.
