(Prompt from The First Line. Check them out, they’re sharing some great work!)
I started collecting secrets
when I was just
six
years
old.
I kept them in a notebook labeled
SECRETS
in crayon because I was only
six
years
old.
The first was about
Mommy.
The secret was
that
she didn’t really love Daddy
all the time.
I didn’t really understand
of course
because I was just
six
years
old.
There were more secrets at
six
years
old.
Like the one about
my kindergarten teacher.
The secret was
that
she called us
LITTLE DEVILS
in her head sometimes.
Because we were,
I’m sure.
After all,
we were only
six
years
old.
As I grew older,
seven and eight and so on
years
old,
I would ask my friends
if they had a notebook labeled
SECRETS
in crayon.
No.
And I came to understand
that not everyone could hear the
SECRETS
inside other people’s heads.
Mommy said the first secret
out loud to Daddy
and
I ripped that page
out of the notebook
crayon-labeled
SECRETS
and
my parents
parted
too.
At
six
years
old
I didn’t know my secrets
could get me in
trouble.
Or, rather,
get other people in trouble
with me.
A secret at
six(teen)
years
old:
Nobody will ask her to the prom
because
she is strange.
I lost friends.
I collected secrets that I didn’t want
to keep.
I ripped more pages and
wished
I’d never started
collecting secrets.
How could I have known at
six
years
old
that the secrets I would collect at
(twenty-)six
years
old
would fill the pages
of my head
with scribbles of crayon
like the one I used
to write
SECRETS
in a notebook
when I was just
six
years
old?