(This is part of The Girls Who Went Away: Poems. Note that poetry is best read on a larger screen.)
When I get pregnant, it’s my seventeenth Birthday. He’s Cape Verdean Portuguese And thirty-one years old. Me, I’m an artist, And all his paintings are so beautiful. I still remember what I wore that night: A psychedelic paisley-printed minidress And purple Indian sandals. I run away before my sister rats Me out. I know some hippies living in A cheap place, with a mattress on the floor And Jimi Hendrix posters on the walls. My best friend, even if you burn her arm With cigarettes, she won't tell; but my mom’s Hysterical, and hounds another friend Until she breaks. Today I understand The terror that she felt. They send me to a home for unwed mothers. The nuns there call me Marsha; no one knows My name. One of the girls is just fourteen. Another had been raped, and left beside The road. Back then, there was a lot of meanness. The only happy memory was my dad Bringing us Dunkin’ Donuts once a week. In labor, in the hospital, I shit The bed. Then there’s this suctiony—this kind Of emptying out. And then there is a baby. I name her Raina. But for three whole days I do not get to hold her. Afterward I’m really sore; they’d had to sew me up. I’m surprised, with teenage Catholic girls, That they don’t just sew up the whole damn thing. My parents take me home. I sit in back Of their big Chrysler, and I turn and watch The hospital recede, and disappear. Then I become complete ripped terror: wailing, Screaming, until I’m totally crumpled in. My dad’s a statue, white-knuckles on the wheel. My mom looks straight ahead, but from behind I see her shoulders heaving up and down. Nobody says a word.
After “Claudia,” in The Girls Who Went Away by Ann Fessler.