Because her father’s bottles are hollow bells by Jennifer Luebbers via Redivider

ringing in the grease-stained garage,

because the ritual of his lips make a slow slur
of her name, every day after school

for all of fifth grade Tara and I make our legs
into wind and bike past porches

and over the creek bridge, and when we meet
the boys at the cemetery behind the schoolyard,

and gather among the gravestones, it is still
a game. And when one of them closes his eyes

and counts, Tara teaches me to kneel tight
enough to fit a tabernacle, to fold my limbs

to fit the shadow of stone; to make myself
soundless, to wait in stillness to feel

a boy’s hand, and I wait there like that
and wait there like that, and I wait until

I can’t anymore, until the fear of being
forgotten grows larger than any other fear—

and then I know without her to show me:
all I have to do is breathe, and I’ll be found.