summer.

summer
summer 
summer

all the other girls 
are bitches. they speak with fluency i don’t 
understand. they have a secret 
stash of ice cream. they giggle in the mornings, warm 
their lips on the grass. i watch with awkward feet. 
i am fraudulent, half-wrong, but i want to be good.

the men, though––the men are tall, dark
and haptic, 
just like everyone said they would be. 

i tell the girls i’ve been invited 
to be a model but my feminist mother is ruining my life. 
she writes No Barbies Please 
on birthday invitations, wipes my Bubble Gum 
Yum Yum on her sleeve. no lip colour, 
no nail polish, no tv. 

between bunk bed columns 
beyond darkened cabin window
i see a blinking boy. 

in our well-lit cabin, training bra’d tweens 
squeal and cover-chest, dive onto beds 
like sensually-fainting-girl cartoons. 

he pants, wet mouthed
nearly dripping from the jowls. i stiffen. 
something like electricity buzzes circles around me. 

his eyes, shiny and concave like an old TV. 
the background shows slender topless girls
mouths agape on beds. in the foreground, reflection of someone

who looks like me. in the ears, buzz buzz. i can’t decide
if the girls’ lips look more like cochineal or Jessica. 
a neon-red scream flies like flames

licking glossy surface of the lake. 
no one has ever named such a thing. we mistake it
for morning, lunch, evening bells.

after.

after, life is different. you are different. 

you change yourself. 
you begin with common parts––legs, underarms, 
isthmus between eyebrows 
used to be Very Hungry Caterpillar
now just anorexic. your great aunt’s moustache 
terrifies you. your mother teaches you
to peel apples before eating them. you don’t understand 
why, but the habit sticks. you peel everything, crave 
bare flesh, pluck fuzz before pressing peach 
to lips. the hunger grows, grazes knee pits,
toe knuckles, nape where mothers hang
kittens like cloaks. you go hunting 
every night in your bedroom mirror. 
catch your face, the birthmarks 
as they jump, buzz, impishly rub 
their little front legs. your eyes burn
from all the staring. without a doubt, 
this is your true self. finally

all your fingers are bleeding.

found (1)

*This poem is an erasure of the CBC News article, "Jian Ghomeshi found not guilty on choking and all sex assault charges" written by Mark Gollom (Mar 24, 2016).

jaz papadopoulos is a queer first-gen/settler writer and multimedia artist, educator, and recent MFA graduate. They are a Lambda Literary Fellow, with work published in The Uniter, PRISM Magazine, VanDocument, and more. jaz is from Treaty 1 territory and currently resides on Coast Salish land. Follow them online here.