Marisa P. Clark
The Bed Where I Lost My Virginity Was a Queen
Four-poster antique. No canopy.
Spires of dark wood, carved
like long screws about to pierce
the ceiling. She kept it
shoved against the wall—
the side I occupied. She slept
next to the nightstand, where
the alarm clock with its dull
glow-in-the-dark digits flipped
once per minute. I’d drift,
then snap to with each new click.
A jewelry box with a painted glass top
opened on her wedding band,
a selection of necklaces and earrings,
and those most precious gems:
her just-in-case pills. Pills pilfered
in case suicide became necessity.
Where she kept her gun, I don’t
recall. To use the bathroom,
I eased from under
tatty sheets, crawled to the foot
of the bed, climbed down, and after,
remounted that tall mattress.
I tried to hold it, tried
not to wake her or her gray tabby
tomcat with eyes of jade
that tracked our every move.
Marisa P. Clark reads “The Bed Where I Lost My Virginity Was a Queen”
Marisa P. Clark is the author of the poetry collection Bird (Unicorn Press, 2024). Her prose and poetry appear in Shenandoah, Cream City Review, Nimrod, Epiphany, Foglifter, Prairie Fire, Rust + Moth, Sundog Lit, Texas Review, and elsewhere. Best American Essays 2011 recognized her creative nonfiction among its Notable Essays. A queer writer, she grew up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, came out in Atlanta, Georgia, and lives in New Mexico with two parrots, a border terrier, and whatever wildlife and strays chance to visit.