The Bath

Something – everything
Wrong all wrong
I know now
I didn’t then
I burst in – intuitively
Propelled by my
Own vague memory
There a too familiar
Too intimate scene
Mother and little sister
In the bath together
Annulling “perfectly innocent”
Mother reclining in warm water
Child standing shivering
Naked confused paralysis
At seven just shy of
Her First Communion
My sister was too old
For this – Was our mother
Informing or diddling?
(A talk or book would do)
We know now
We didn’t then
Comprehension costing
An obliteration of decades
Our mother was
Likely reenacting her
Own horrific history

David Sapp, writer, artist, and professor, is a Pushcart nominee. His work appears widely in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. His publications include chapbooks Close to Home and Two Buddha, a novel Flying Over Erie, and a book of poems and drawings titled Drawing Nirvana.