Summer Boy

 The boy of the swimming pool

With shocking dark hair

So dark it always shined as if wet 

 

Like a bit of night

Rising in the pool,

Pale arms and penetrating eyes 

 

Behind glasses taking in

From where you seemed to stand apart,

In the elementary classroom 

 

Where you sat apart,

Penetrating eyes I hoped would see

Yet not, that I was not a girl to be seen, 

 

Not truly, not perceived—

Truth being awkward then,

And you of all were likely to see 

 

I feigned the girl

Stepping through the forms

Expected, children of our age— 

 

Now everyone’s so young here.

You are so young here,

The boy I hold of you, 

 

Never my summer boy—

I wasn’t deserving of summer boys,

Only kept the forms expected, 

 

Girls of my age who couldn’t stay,

In homes we couldn’t speak of

And you of all were likely to see— 

 

I don’t recall if it stormed that day,

But thickets of blackberries

Lined the fields 

 

Down the lane

I raced my bicycle home,

Knowing I wouldn’t be back— 

 

The water too clean,

Your hair shining of night,

Truth being awkward then. 

 

                                                                     

Bonnyview Elementary School
Mr. Davis' 6th Grade Class
Redding, CA, 1973