Do you remember the games we played as children?
The rose garden? Last one standing?
Ones our parents never heard about.
We played on the tender parts, the underneath,
the soft side of the wrists,
planting pink roses in each other’s garden.
The girls that is.
The boys played the other game.
If a girl thought you were weak,
all the girls would mock you
and they would plant white roses.
You in shame would plead,
“plant red roses!”
and they would break the soil with the hoe
and till the soil, rake the soil, plant the seed,
pound the earth, pluck the weeds,
until the roses grew, as they told the story
of the planting, each story, more unique than the last.
The strongest girl would brag when her roses were purple.
But the boys, oh the boys,
played a game the girls were not allowed to play.
Their part in the game was to watch.
Hands around the throat of the other,
The boys would stand facing one another,
as faces turned red, then purple-
until- the last one standing.
WoPoLi 
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