The Magic Words — 30/30, #31

In seventh grade
none of the boys
wanted to have a crush
on Patty Reilly
but it seemed that all of us secretly did,

because she was the only girl we knew
who shared our passion for
Magic Words.

A lot of us were into Magic Words that year.

Some of the words
were obsolete but still tasted good, like
caltrop, trebuchet, and main gauche;

while others not only satisfied but still could conjure, like
landmine, trajectory,  and blood groove.

But Patty loved
the most potent words of all,
the ones that sizzled behind her teeth
and made the adults cringe when they were released:

Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe, Panzer, Mauser, Luger.

She cut her black hair short
and let it fall over one eye.
She wore a lot of brown
and even goose stepped in the halls
and somehow got away with all of it,
her and her long legs
and green eyes,

and the fact that she was
always, always laughing,
and that she was always, always smarter
than all of us in any class,
and that she told everyone
that she didn’t approve of it,
she just found it all
fascinating.

You had to be in love, a little bit,
with Patty Reilly
if you were a boy in my seventh grade class.
We never could have gotten away with that shit,
but she did,

and we learned how —
and about magic —
from watching her.