My sister learned to drive at fourteen
a 1963 4-door red Rambler
AMC classic Kenosha Cadillac
with seats that lay flat
she would hustle us, my brother and me
out the front door as our parent’s tail lights
kissed the corner goodnight
load us into the back seat
slide into the front
shifting her juice can curls
and clutch and grind
and jerk and bounce
down the driveway
as our Myna bird screamed
‘What you going to do to me now!”
from the front window
0ne night, there we were
my sister, her friend,
my brother, me
at the drive-in
the Texas Chain Saw Massacre
the movie started,
the cries and screams started, the skin masks,
blade chasing, wrong doors,
wrong turns
it was a nightmare
I slept with a flashlight for months
once I heard my sister scream
‘What you going to do to me now!’
as my father stumbled from her room
After my sister died,
I never saw that bird again,
my father said suicide
as if it were a cancer,
as if it couldn’t be helped
Writing 