Like a sweet divorce from them, my parents 

granted you custody, my early emancipation 

after a psychologist said we needed a break 

from each other. So, I embraced being set free 

in you, lesser-known sister city down coast 

from Santa Barbara, adorned with palm trees, 

hibiscuses, blood-red bougainvilleas, birds 

of paradise, and oh so many fragrant scents, 

other flowers I couldn’t name. A life 

beginning to bloom, a teenager on her own, 

what did I know about strangers? Or trust? 

The Pierpont Rapist never touched me— 

I didn’t know who he was, what he was; 

we just sat in the sand under a waning moon, 

ocean glimmering with rhythmic motion, 

and talked near the warning waves. Then 

he walked me to my apartment and left. 

My parents didn’t question when I arrived 

back on their doorstep, a picture of the man’s 

face glaring from a page of the local newspaper 

clenched in one hand as I reached out to them, 

eager to step into the arms of reconciliation. 

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Yvette A. Schnoeker-Shorb (she/her) is the author of Shapes That Stay (Kelsay Books). Her poetry has appeared in Slipstream Magazine, New York Quarterly, Gargoyle Magazine Online, About Place Journal, AJN: The American Journal of Nursing, and other publications. She lives in the Central Highlands of Arizona.