If This Is Sex, It Must Be Tuesday

So it was every week on a Tuesday,
that you and your friend, Ginny,
strayed from the dance at St. Anselm’s
to Duquesne Gardens, feigning interest
in hockey, waiting to get laid.
I can picture it—you in fake cashmere
with pearl buttons, a gabardine skirt
that hit you at midcalf, you and Ginny
shuffling popcorn till last period,
when you’d freshen your lips with TORRID RED
for the after game party at the Webster Hall dorms.
After all, these were the Pittsburgh Hornets,
this was 1951, and you were a poor Irish girl
from Garfield with a hard drive for excitement,
and hockey was it, getting cross-checked by the best,
having stories to tell in your lean, checkered life,
left with no father, a reluctant sister,
and a mother who cleaned houses for the rich.
So when did I happen, this one-night stand 
with the MVP after his big, icy win,
the second Tuesday in February, or the third?
Do you remember the feel of his hands on you?
Were they rough, or tender, were they bloody
from fighting? And when your belly grew into
the body you never wanted, did you curse me,
try to cut me? Should I say you did your best, 
a spare girl from a broken family,
or should I say it straight—
you wanted it, you took it, like we all do,
you lied to save yourself, you gave away
part of your heart, you couldn’t
wish it right. 

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Listen to a reading of the poem.