Paper Doll

Today I went to the graveyard by the school, an old graveyard, a long forgotten place where the markers are like jagged teeth sticking up haphazardly along the sloping overgrown grounds. I was called there, I am often called there, usually I ignore the call, this time I could not.

I sat down under a tree. It was night.

I took an offering.

A small sad paper doll with eyes like mine. She pleaded with me and I said that it had to be.

I buried her under the tree.

With her I buried my sadness…

my loneliness

regret

fear

resentment

and the possibility of anything that could grow from the tie between her and me.

I gave her a headstone of a rock that glowed in the darkness.

Her small white foot stuck out from the bottom of the grave.

I told her that I could not keep her, I pushed her tiny foot into the dirt and mashed it down.

I threw dirt on a grave once.

I said goodbye to someone once.

I can do it again.

Tracy would come to visit his grandparents every summer. I would also visit my grandparents who lived next door to them. We were both 5 years old and were playmates but every time Tracy would encounter me for the first time of the summer I would run away from him, feigning disinterest. I would ignore him, overtly or subtly, coquetishly evading him.

I recall running in and around my Papa's grapevine into the open field behind Tracy’s grandparents' house and along the tree line with Tracy’s voice trailing behind me sweetly, “Lisa! Lisa! Where are you going, come back, let’s play!!” I have no idea how I knew to run from him and evade him for just the right amount of time. Eventually I would succumb and we would play together all summer long.