Her father is a teacher of History
a teacher at a junior high school
He is an excellent teacher
a disastrous father
None of his students
suspect this

She’s always talking about this
Sheni talks about this
It is a division of which
his students are oblivious

For in class he has a wit
that even eighth-graders appreciate
eighth-graders in Honors History
He had an easy manner
an amiable manner
Nothing suggested ideology

At home he retreated
to the backyard
and stamped out a trail
among the trees
the trees had been planted
by the previous owners
he traced a trail
through the yard
among the trees
A large yard with a slope
and a lot of trees
he meticulously
etched out this trail
Putting ceramic pieces in the ground
and pieces of glass and pottery
he meticulously turned his trail
into a path

He methodically laid down this path
Laid down the shards
of pots and planters
broken to pieces
He might only progress
six-inches to a foot
in an evening
before the light failed

The ground once hard,
for all the ground, in Southern California
is hard, the mortar
of dried river beds,
the ground had been softened
by the shade of the trees
and in his path
he laid shards as tile

His first daughter grew up
he was awkward around her
uneasy, an uneasiness
unlike in his classroom
There is a plaster patch
that is visible
in the kitchen wall
her mother later told her the reason why
her mother told her
when she was a baby
Sheni had been crying
had been crying in her highchair
She had been crying
inconsolably
as babies sometimes do
He simply put his fist through the wall

He would not permit his wife
to go out and get a job
They had met working
as rangers in a park
Once married, he forbade his wife
to go out and get a job
In the beginning
she probably did not want to
They had had a baby

eventually three kids
For many years
she probably did not want to

On weekends she helped
the whole family helped
inflate balloons
for car dealerships
the family would be awakened
at four-thirty in the morning
to inflate balloons
for car dealerships
the three kids slept
in the back
the back of the Datsun
the three kids slept in the car
Sheni’s mother and father
inflated balloons
the festoons of balloons
that decorate dealership lots

Her father would not allow
her mother to get a job
and gradually
they worked up a debt
He went to church regularly

They went to church every Sunday
He mother took to sewing
her own dresses

Five years ago
the parents stopped talking
She knows now her mother
had an affair
For he allowed her no friends
he allowed her no job
Must have been a man
from the church

A man from the church
a man from the church
Perhaps
a car salesman

Although she did go outside
He did not forbid her that
She went grocery shopping
and ran errands
While he entertained his students
She sometimes went out
She went grocery shopping
and ran errands

But in going outside
there was little joy
She had nearly forgotten
the pleasure of desire
Her father’s wife had had an affair
Her mother had had an affair
Did she tell him?
Did he even know?
They simply stopped talking
He started to sleep on the floor
He started to sleep on the floor
next to their bed

He slept on the floor
next to the bed
He slept on the floor
for five years
Then she moved out of the house
He told her to move out
After sleeping on the floor
for five years

Sheni’s mother moved out
She moved out of the house
He moved out of the bedroom
And her sister moved in
Her sister moved in
into the master bedroom
And her father moved
into her sister’s room

For her mother meanwhile
had had the affair
and it was agreed between them
when she turned eighteen
when she turned eighteen
the youngest daughter
turned eighteen
the parents would seek a divorce

Perhaps her father had harbored
a secret ambition
An ambition that had been
disappointed
He was a Methodist
a devout Methodist
and he certainly showed himself
methodical