But I’m a girl!
Maybe I liked firetrucks
better than dolls.
Maybe my three sisters
acted more like Mother expected.
Maybe I didn’t iron well,
even pillowcases.
Maybe my washed dishes
testified to what had been contained.
Maybe I mixed clothes with others
creating dissonance.
Maybe I found comfort in food too often.
Maybe only clothes marked “husky” fit.
Maybe comfort foods became reflexive,
then habitual, then compulsive.
Maybe the husky became three or four
or five X’s and the scales screamed
“three hundred” and the love all around me
was unheard through my self-hatred.
Maybe half a century after
“Daddy’s little boy” I found
a group of people who called themselves
Compulsive Overeaters
and, in the Rooms of Recovery,
I could recognize I’d been loved
all those years.