Jenny Boully
First Death
The moon was a disorderly thing that stuck and then unstuck and then stuck again.
We went camping a lot.
It was the summer of darting minnows.
The edge, the lake, the lapping of waves, the stones skipping out forever against all of that.
Sunburn and then the blister and flake and freckle of it.
Glinting on the waves were sequins that stuck and then unstuck and then stuck again.
There was a lot of hiding under beds.
We children had snuck into the Na Pon’s room and found the clutch there.
The clutch contained hundred dollar bills.
The gleam of the sequins, the bright stars, her wig just a few feet away.
We did not know she wore a wig.
The wigstand just a white egg.
Life was a false thing that stuck and then unstuck.
We were amazed: the amount, the domination; we had never seen so many, so much.
She had been saving them to send home.
It was the summer of dandruff and peeling skin.
Our mothers had never seen so much.
The smell of head emanating from under the beds.
The yard sale: we had come to see the dead woman’s things; we had come to see Uncle Ron, to see if he needed anything.
The wig just a few feet away.
I thought I should like to be the one who brushed that hair: Na Pon who was so beautiful and little and lovely.
But now she was dead.
It was the summer of faceless eggs.
In the photo album, in the photograph, Uncle Ron tall and blond, baby-blue suit and white bucks and the tan and brown Coor’s can.
The black and white wallet portrait of Na Pon in my mother’s album: the sad look, the future too near.
A young Thai bride who had come to America just to die.
(The wig was just a few feet away.)
Another photo: Uncle Ron naked and spread-eagled on their bed.
We thought that was what adults did.
The corsage in the other photograph, the short, frilly pink dress: were these her wedding best?
It was the summer of coconut flakes, the crazy cake that didn’t take.
We children snuck the snacks under the beds.
We invent a story: all those bills, the pretty clutch, the naked photograph.
We thought that was what adults did.
The cake coconut, the carpet white shag, the yellowing custard of the wig pad.
Now she was dead.
We thought that was what adults did.
Home was a thing that unstuck then stuck then unstuck again.
The young brides were horrified. The body embalmed, the casket, the body underground.
No one had called any monks to help find the way.
All summer, under the stars, we wished we may we wished we might have the wish we wished tonight.
Nothing ever came of it.
Camp fire was a thing that extinguished itself by morning.
Things went wrong; nothing straightened right.
Our mothers came after us with fury.
Life was a thing that unstuck and then could not stick again.
We children hid under beds.
It was the summer of slushy drinks.
The juice of it stained us deep red.
We children collected the points on the cups for things our Thai mothers didn’t know how to redeem.
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Jenny Boully is the author of The Body: An Essay, The Book of Beginnings and Endings: Essays, [one love affair]*, and other books. She has a new collection of essays forthcoming from Coffee House in 2018.