_____'s Girl | Melissa McEwen

First published in Mipo: a Community Chapbook, 2009


_____'s Girl

In Junior High School, I wanted

to be owned

by a possessive

noun, owned by a noun—proper,

the correct way: a hickey

on the face so the whole school could see

that you were his baby, like a wedding ring, like a tattoo

of his name on your left breast, like having

his baby and giving it his last name

or whole name if it were a boy, like

the girl who had all of the above

by the time she finished high school. I

remember in chemistry class

how the hickey on her cheek shined

under the classroom's light

like she was stung or bitten and we

all knew who did it. I couldn't look

away, wanted to possess it, peel it off

and stick it on me, study it

at home in front of the mirror

in the bathroom with the lamp

with no shade.