My clarinet squeaked
in a chorus of sick geese.
No hope of migration.
Ann-Marie was the princess.
Spiky hair, holey jeans.
Mickey Mouse bounced
on her bosom-parade
in the hall.
Tara flanked her
like a glossy-lipped
guard dog. Keeping
the riff-raff away.
She tortured the school’s
only Mexican girl.
“Hey monkey-face, Is it true
that your mom is a maid?”
In high school, we both
hung around with Crazy Abby.
Boys packed the lawn of her parents’
Tudor mansion. Camaros and Trans Ams
clogged the streets for blocks.
Abby went topless, Tara smoked pot,
I played my flute in the nude.
At graduation, someone yelled
“Pucker-butt!” as I got my diploma.
It was Tara.
She wore a boxy red
suit to our 20th reunion–
silky bob, law degree
When she saw me,
she squinted at my name-tag,
moved on.
I stood by the pretzels, watched Abby
dance to “Rock Lobster”.
Down, down, the song melted,
pushing me back to the band room,
to that lost and simple key of C.

————–

About The Author:

Laurie Barton was born in southern California and studied French Literature at Mills College in the Bay Area. Then she moved to San Sebastian, Spain. After several years of traveling, she has returned to southern California, where she teaches English to speakers of other languages.