What I Wanted When I Was Twelve

For Mom and Beth to move back home

For Dad to stop smoking

For him to be happy again

To be able to do a cartwheel like Tammy

To curl my bangs into a fan shape without burning my forehead

To know how to talk to boys

To get Mike Taylor to like me

To hold his hand during “Couples and Trios”

To skate backwards like that head-banger guy to Welcome to the Jungle

To know all the words to “Ice, Ice Baby”

A pair of Hammer pants

To start my own Babysitters Club.

C and C Music Factory’s single “Everybody Dance Now”

To dance like Sarah Jessica Parker in “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”

Frosty pink lipstick

A ride to the mall.

A “Coed Naked” t-shirt

For my chest to grow so I can stop pinning shoulder pads inside my bra

To sing like Wilson Phillips.

To watch all the Halloween movies

To not have to babysit my sister after school

To perfect dance moves with Tammy to Van Halen’s “Jump”

To be Becca from Life Goes On.

To see my poem published in the National Library of Poetry’s book (I paid $30).

To sit with Kathleen Kennedy at lunch

For fat Sabrina Wimbsatt to stop following me around

For Nicole Ellis not to stare at me on the bus with her snake eyes and say she’s gonna beat me up

For everyone to believe the name with hearts I wrote all over my books was really my boyfriend’s.

To stop crying so much

To go back to my old school

To go back to church

For Mom to leave Jim

To be able to see her again without us fighting

For her to understand why I’m mad at her

For Dad not to be gone so much

For it always to be like on car-rides to New Jersey when I have him to myself

To have him to myself

To have him