Fabulous Secrets Were Revealed to Me

Fabulous Secrets Were Revealed to Me

By the time I was seven or eight,
I had a plan for my death.
Not when or how. But what
I’d be holding—
right hand clenched on the
Book of Mormon,
black cover,
gold leaf pages,
thick ticket 
to eternity. 

And wrapped in the cape of my 
left palm:
She-Ra,
the action figure.
Because she’s a badass,
and heaven
sounds boring. 

Photo by Tobias Rademacher on Unsplash

“Fabulous secrets were revealed to me the day I held aloft my sword and said ‘For the honor of Greyskull!’. I am She-Ra!” - She-Ra

The Prompt

As a participant in a local poetry workshop yesterday, I was offered this prompt: Recall an object you loved in childhood. A toy or game or stuffed animal or blanket. Something you couldn’t get enough of.

Barbies and She-Ra came immediately to mind for me. I considered writing a poem about how our Boston terrier Bailey chewed on the arms of most of my Barbies. I thought about how I needed a story that let me love and forgive my dog but still love my Barbies, scars and all, so from then on out, every game of Barbie-based make-believe began with a tragic, mutilating car accident, from which Barbie arose stronger, albeit with deep grooves cut it into her arms. Sometimes love is like that. We search for the kindest story we can find—one that lets us love and forgive everybody. Sometimes, we take that goodness-of-heart too far and don’t put our Barbies away and have to add more details to our stories to account for the disfiguring of their heads and legs.

In the end, writing a poem about She-Ra seemed easier. Maybe I’ll come back to Barbie later.

I hope you’ll join me in playing with this prompt! Here are a few other questions to consider if you’d like: What did the beloved toy or object look, feel, or smell like? Do you associate any particular sounds with it? What stories, people, places, hopes, or fears ride alongside it in your memory? Do you still have it? If not, what became of it? Or what do you hope became of it?

What connections might there be between this object (and your love of it) and your current adult life? Or if you’re feeling really adventurous, what might this toy or object say if a poem were written from its perspective?

I look forward to reading your poems and meeting your inanimate childhood friends and protectors!