Ill-Prepared

Across from her at the round kitchen table, 

I’d sit dipping Oreos into milk— sometimes

a whole roll of them, depending the the length

of the story and whether it was a schoolyard slight

or some remarkable classroom revelation.

When I was older,  I’d sometimes substitute

cheese swirled from a can and curled 

onto rounds of Ritz crackers left in the roll.

But mostly, after school, it was Oreos.

How could they not know?

Don’t humans recognize other humans?

I was learning about slavery.

I was learning about the holocaust.

Didn’t they know if you cut a person open—

any person— we’d all look the same?

She tried to explain— something

about the power of evil or the heart of man.

Whatever she said as she sat with me 

at our round formica table afterschool,

my mother did not adequately prepare me

for the brutality of the world I loved.