The first boy I kissed
Had a crescent moon smile
Always shining on his face.

We were cast in the school play and
His hand met mine behind the curtain.
The moon was white and I kissed him
Underneath a set of swings.

I turned thirteen and thought
His hands were too big.
I looked up and the crescent
Moon began to wane.

Three years later I learned that
the first boy I kissed was killed
Just before the fourth of July.

The moon didn’t shine
That night.

When I was only fourteen
I fell in love with a girl who
Had hair that burned bright red.
I told her all that I knew and
We dreamt of a life spent
In salt water rooms.

The next boy I kissed tasted
Like mountain dew but I
Let his hands wander in the
Backseat anyway. My eyes
Must have looked like the moon.

I met someone who seemed
To know about the world.
I became addicted to the fire
That burned behind every
Single word he spoke.

I gave myself to him because
I wanted to learn how to feel.
But he couldn’t teach me how
To fall in love with the texture of life.

I kissed a boy who was tall
Like a tree branch.
I let him hold me for a month
Before I got tired of the splinters.

The boy after him had collared shirts
And a film collection.
I kissed him while a clockwork orange
Played on the television screen.

But he felt too many things
And I couldn’t feel at all.
We threw some words like knives
And it stung too much so
We shut off the movie screen.

My senior year, after I saw
The first boy’s big hands
Folded in a casket, I
Wondered why no one
Could ever stay.

At one in the morning, a
Girl came to my driveway and
Beneath moonlight she
Told me that she was afraid.

Her hands were cold and small
But I held them in mine anyway.

We spent a year hiding beneath
Blankets, both afraid of different
Beasts. But life can’t be lived
From behind closet doors and
Beneath the blankets all we
Did was whisper lies.

I let those lies cover me, though.
They were warm and I was cold,
Too cold to go and find
A real fire.

My first year away from home
I met a boy with red shoes and
Hands that seemed to fit in mine.

He played the bassoon and
I tried to love the wooden sound.
We would lay beneath moonlight
And both drift off to different places.

I met a boy who danced with the moon
And smelled like cigarettes.
I kissed him because I thought
His hands would be the only thing
To keep me from falling apart.

But he had no glue and
I broke anyway.

The boy with red shoes came back
To sweep up the mess.
He played his wooden song and
I closed my eyes, happy
To be held again.

But he must have cut himself on
One of the shards because the
Boy with red shoes went home.

He went to look for a bandage
From the girl he still loved.

My own hands are red
in the moonlight.
Raw from trying too hard to feel.

Instead of being held
They now only hold a pen.
They’re trying to remember
What they were made for.