Sep 6, 2017
Image: Airman Magazine
Mom made us matching guidebooks to Alaska,
copied, bound in a Kinkos
in the Valley on a school day.
We have made it. The frontier.
Rented car & Day Four:
Mom hides out in a Kodiak
internet café, dashes off missives
to RootBeer, secret boyfriend,
former country-music DJ.
RootBeer is not yet a known threat
to our family. We drive through Denali,
denial. I listen only & wholly
to Barenaked Ladies, press play,
play, play. I pretend it hardly matters
our father refuses our rotation
of sitting backseat. The only male,
he is perpetually the assumptive
shotgun. I am fourteen. Life just now grows
its big tits of unfair. We are here in Alaska
on a ten-day car trip.
In six months, she’ll admit the affair.
In a year he’ll sign off on divorce.
I’ll stay a virgin three years after that
but here in Alaska
is the first place men see me,
see my breasts orbiting within
my galaxy of skin.
My body’s the eventual
swirling Milky Way. When a stranger
in flannel blows a kiss on the highway,
I press one nipple to the window
of our rented Ford Escape.
My family drives three hours
to stare at black worms trapped in glaciers.
We come back at twilight & walk in pairs: girls
& grown-ups on the dock.
Between salmon dead
& salmon dying, Mom
holds our father’s hand in the light.
It’s midnight & I notice
men & women everywhere
flip a universe for cock.
...we need your help. Confronting the many challenges of COVID-19—from the medical to the economic, the social to the political—demands all the moral and deliberative clarity we can muster. In Thinking in a Pandemic, we’ve organized the latest arguments from doctors and epidemiologists, philosophers and economists, legal scholars and historians, activists and citizens, as they think not just through this moment but beyond it. While much remains uncertain, Boston Review’s responsibility to public reason is sure. That’s why you’ll never see a paywall or ads. It also means that we rely on you, our readers, for support. If you like what you read here, pledge your contribution to keep it free for everyone by making a tax-deductible donation.
September 06, 2017
Copyright © 1993-2020 Boston Review and its authors.
Printing Note: For best printing results try turning on any options your web browser's print dialog makes available for printing backgrounds and background graphics.
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
Confronting the challenges of this moment demands all the moral and deliberative clarity we can muster. While much remains uncertain, Boston Review’s responsibility to public reason is sure. Sign up for our newsletter and don’t miss a thing.
