I.
The summer my cousins return from Nairobi,
we sit in a circle by the oak tree in my aunt’s garden,
and they look older. Amel’s hardened nipples
push through the paisley of her blouse,
minarets calling men to worship.
When they left, I was twelve years old and swollen
with the heat of waiting. We hugged at the departure gate,
waifs with bird chests clinking like wood, boyish,
long-skirted figurines waiting to grow
into our hunger. My mother uses her quiet voice
on the phone:
Are they all okay? Are they healing well?
She doesn’t want my father to overhear.

II.
Juwariyah, my age, leans in and whispers,
I’ve started my period. Her hair is in my mouth when
I try to move in closer—how does it feel?
She turns to her sisters, and a laugh that is not hers
stretches from her body like a moan.
She is more beautiful than I can remember.
One of them pushes my open knees closed.
Sit like a girl. I finger the hole in my shorts,
shame warming my skin.
In the car, my mother stares at me through the
rearview mirror, the leather sticks to the back of my
thighs. I open my legs like a well-oiled door,
daring her to look at me and give me
what I had not lost—a name.