Luke Skyywalker directs our thin high school bodies to Shake!
So we shake again and again. All I want is a boy gyrating

against my leg. I want to be like Tavia, who is mid-gym, one leg
hoisted in the crook of Justin’s elbow while simultaneously

twerking her crotch. Justin bends lower and lower
under each of Tavia’s thrusts. In this 2pm school cafetorium

humid with our stink the only rhythm that matters
is in my chest’s red burn. But I am awkward

and I don’t have long hair or light eyes. I must rely on my outfit
and matching socks to get a dance. Even if the hard basketball star

with a bowl fade and gapped teeth aims his gangly body at me,
I will circle my slim pelvis into him.

At this age, every song is an occasion for us to dance
on anything sweaty in a basement or cookout

or school dance. Uncle Luke’s bass is dead set
on making a choreography of our hunger and rub.

In each thrust, each pop, each hip swing
our bodies become a taboo mass of arms and gropes.

We want to free up parts our mothers have warned
to keep locked in a delicate chest. Slow grinding

is a thing grown folks do when they are alone in a room,
a slurry song closing the small gap

between their hips and backsides. We do not slow grind,
or slow dance or two-step. We freak. We shake it. We

pop that cootchie on a boys’ circling waist. I watch
as Tavia hooks her slender brown hand

around Justin’s neck. Luke calls Shake it!
A senior places himself behind Tavia, then Katrina

is behind him. Shake it! orders Luke and a snaking line
of bodies lengthens one fleshy student after another. Luke

will not let up. Shake it. It begins. My wobble and pop. Shake it!
I step towards the conduction of this raunchy teenage fire,

but Mrs. Jackson, the math teacher, has begun to storm
our huddle, inch by inch, separating our hormonal parts.

Shake it! Luke’s beat seizes my groin. Finally, I am not scared
or stiff. I shake what Luke has promised me. I shake

and shake and shake. But before I can join the others
with my good slow grind, Mrs. Jackson has made it to the center

and torn our huddle apart. My body left
trembling with too much possibility.