The Boy I Said I Loved at Seventeen

PAM O’BRIEN

was full of angles, brittle places
probably broken off
by his father who drank too much
or by his mother who worked too hard
at the printing shop and then at home,
trying to keep that drifting family together.

The boy worked weekends
at Powell Avenue gas station;
saved his money for the 14-karat necklace
that he pushed into my hand on Christmas Eve.

I didn’t have many nice things: 
one twin sweater set in a soft green,
a tweed skirt.
I wore his necklace with that.
I lost his gift. On the bus to school,
it circled my neck.
By lunchtime—gone.

I didn’t want to tell him. He noticed right away,
yelled about how many Sundays
of pumping gas that gold chain cost.

Later I left Erie and enlisted
as the scholarship girl at a ritzy college.
He joined the Navy.
We stayed in touch, but you know the old story; 
it was never the same.

It was about something
we couldn’t name at seventeen.
And barely know it now.

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