So long ago, it’s almost like we dreamed it,
that red-haired girl fell through the ice at Stetson
Pond the year we were struggling to master
long division. And then the big No Skating
sign went up, which soon got painted over
with some sort of obscenity: a phallus, maybe
a middle finger, though others say it was
a swastika. Far as we know they never
caught who did it. Mostly adults figured
it was kids just being kids. We are the adults
now, old ones, here at the 40th class reunion,
and no one can remember that girl’s name.
What we do recall is she came to our town
straight from Ireland or Scotland. She sure
had a pretty accent, though we laughed out loud
when she spoke in class. And she was a ghost,
most likely, in the Halloween play. But half
of us were ghosts. Then someone clears
his throat and almost whispers, Trapped
under ice, eyes wide, mouth filling… and who
would ever paint a swastika? To which
the rest of us drop our heads in silence, glance
furtively at each other’s flimsy name tags.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 26, Issue 2.
Richard Jordan’s poems appear or are forthcoming in Terrain, Connecticut River Review, Rattle, Valparaiso Poetry Review, New York Quarterly, Gargoyle Magazine, Sugar House Review, Tar River Poetry, South Florida Poetry Journal and elsewhere. His debut chapbook, “The Squannacook at Dawn”, won first place in the 2023 Poetry Box Chapbook Contest. He serves as an Associate Editor for Thimble Literary Magazine and lives in the Boston area.
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