We Got Down – Tyler Dempsey

February 28, 2021

What stands out, is her hips rippling, for the thing naughty girls like best. Where is it, she asked, this night of which we’re talking, when Jane got down, on her knees. Where she got. Where she placed a palm on my jeans, and licked, up and down her puckered up lips.

 

 

Call me, Papa. I said.

 

 

Papa’s house was talking to me. 

 

 

Whispering, like it does to a person like me. 

 

 

This house, of which we are talking—talks. When Papa lived here, this house didn’t talk to Papa like it talked to other people. To other people, it might say, Rainbow. It might say, Different. What it said to Papa, was different. 

 

 

Now Papa lives in the made from dirt dirt, where roads curl like curly-cue’s and people don’t live in the large houses set way back in the woods. Now that Papa lives in the dirt, I’m Papa. 

 

 

That’s me. 

 

 

It’s the name people who are saying my name say. 

 

 

Where is it, Papa, is how Jane said it. 

 

 

When this house talks to me, it talks through me. Through my lips. Myself, is not who I am when Papa’s house talks through me. 

 

 

I’m Papa. Like Papa. Like Papa before him. 

 

 

I was someone other than me, is what I’m saying. When Jane got down on her knees, when she puckered up her lips on the oil of my jeans. When I looked through Clara—rippling her hips, giggling, like this. 

 

 

You girls are going to get in trouble.