One Writer's Beginnings

“I’ve got the dirt on Ruth,” she says 
and the child playing beneath the table 
pictures her mother lifting the lid 
off Ruth’s hamper to breathe 
the stale smell of the clothes. 

Of course this dirt traveled 
cleanly through phone lines 
from ladies like her mother 
who never hold secrets. Who, 
even as they offer advice, 
rehearse the words they’ll use, 
select the people to tell. 

Mean, the girl thinks, working 
the stiff legs of Barbie into capris. 
Still, she’s drawn into the thick 
twists of a good story 
as the hushed shuffle of slippers, 
the stretched tail of the phone cord, 
make their way from sink to stove.