Trust
The thick night air
of the Armpit of the South
parted reluctantly
as I abandoned the safety of the kiddie pool
with my dad sitting nearby,
talking to a bearded man I didn't know,
with the big pool calling to me,
seeming cool and welcoming,
not so lonely
as my solitary existence
in the puddle had been before;
I waddled carefully
across the stucco patio with a sneaky frame of mind;
the pavement was
almost poky enough to
do damage to my tender feet,
without a guide, the walk seemed
longer, and the chain link fence
loomed as a barrier from the street;
I knew the expanse of water
was off limits without accompaniment;
I wanted to go it alone
in the deep,
knowing this, I stepped in,
holding carefully to the rail,
walking down the stairs
until I reached my neck
and the third step;
I ventured one more to test the depth
and the once calm, comforting pool
sucked me out
out deep down
far from the wall,
I was dragged from the wall,
away from the stairs,
I saw the night
when I flailed onto my back,
blazing like a dark hell
with a breathless census of stars.
The calm pool became
my mother's sink,
shiny, cold, clinical,
sure to dispose of
me as easily as
of my little blue and white suit.
I spasmed, splashed,
sent myself farther
from the way I had come,
pushing myself further
from my ability to save my own skin
further from
the bearded man and my father
who saw me at the same time,
but my dad wasn't the one to
jump in after me;
I still see
my dad sitting on the side of the pool
flustered, scared, powerless
under the brown umbrella of the deck chair
beside a rusted white table with blistered edges
while I flailed and cried in another man's arms,
he seemed old in that moment,
ashamed and scared of a drowning girl
without the ability to save me
without the need to resuscitate
knowing that I would be fine without him
when there would always be a
hairy man with big hands to
rescue daddy's little girl;
the man stood
from his deck chair,
paused to remove his shirt,
and jumped;
he had huge hands,
and for a moment, he held
my world in them
He laid me
on the concrete edge
like an offering
while I coughed and cried
and my father worried around me.
