Ants

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My earliest memories are ants crawling up my
swimsuited legs in the
Alabama summertime
counting to three
and assaulting all at once
dreams of horse races in
Kentucky sun
euphemism for early masturbation
and
the way his voice sounded as he told me to
quiet my legs and
let him assault me
which is not a euphemism for anything at all

my family was large and long
stretched taut between
career and religion and
spread wide from family or
relation
my community was the small
quiet space in the basement of our church
in my father’s lap reading
Little House on the Prairie
before bedtime
before my brother would remind me
that if it wasn’t me it’d be our smaller sister
that he couldn’t contain himself
that it both was and wasn’t my fault

so I would stretch my body taut
and spread wide in silence
making a quiet space in the basement of
belief and reality
counting to three
which is not a euphemism for anything at all