when I was 6, my mother told me not to spread rumors. 

i didn’t know what a rumor was

  (i was 6), only that i was seated

     at the edge of a swimming pool,

       telling my older brother’s older friends

         about how we’d had to leave our old 

            rental house because the mean old

          landlady said to buy it or get out. 

        five rental houses, seven houses in all,

      but the rumors chased me to each

    one. under fluffy blankets at slumber

  parties, in dressing rooms that smelled

like hairspray and cough drops, at lunch

  tables covered in the fallen poppy seeds

      of an everything bagel. rumors like food:

        they found them kissing in the snack closet 

          and she called me 15 times and the coach

         is stepping down. rumors on the field, in

      warm-up lines. rumors on the rock wall

    at gym class. and despite my mother’s

   best wishes, i loved them, all of them.

 even the ones that had to do with me.