Teen Summer

Like a bitten truffle, the dark interior

moist and promising, my fifteenth summer

perched within the licked fingertips

of school vacation. Eaten slowly. You can’t

restore or duplicate a teen summer, even

if you want to. Which I don’t—such agony

in new awareness of boys’ lips, hands held,

unexpectedly sweaty. Goosebumps. Swimming

chills your skin. At least it did with mine. All

the things that happened later, at dusk,

first kiss and second, fumbled embrace. Truffle. Bitten.

No, you can’t take it back.

Beth Kanell lives in northeastern Vermont. Her novels include This Ardent Flame and The Long Shadow (SPUR Award winner); her short fiction shows up in Lilith and elsewhere. Find her memoirs on Medium, her reviews at the New York Journal of Books, her poems in small well-lit places.