We were part of a tribe, at least three
to a class, you could scan a room and find us
everywhere, swishing a hula hoop around
our Jennifer hips. Enough of us to populate
Fiji or Damascus, we orbited our own planet,
the paisley atmosphere swirling as the bell
bottoms tolled and the skyrockets took flight.
Mirrored disco ball, each facet released another
known in relation to the initials of our last names
latch-hooked on yarn pillows, ironed on
to the back of our concert gut-shirts.
Macrame belt, god’s eye,
we came out of a dreamsicle,
reigned like corn husk girls easily wrapped
into skirts at the church bazaar.
Our decade was barefoot, tapestry, buttercup,
lemon-lime, rickrack, easy cheese.
To be so abundant, bearing a name that everyone
agreed was lovely, a triple note they wanted
to repeat, I stopped hearing it, the swift hook
of the J, little gem in the mouth, the soft fur
landing, all folded in the envelope of the common.
A Xanadu of Jennifers,
A roller rink of Jennifers,
A decahedron of Jennifers,
I could always see the collective of us.
Unwittingly part of the ensemble yet to be one
meant we were also gifted an alter ego, a spray-on leotard
or chameleon foil lurking under our jumpers.
I run into one of us now in yoga pants,
maybe a child at the hip. We’re tired, we’ve seen
some things but we’re pointed to the horizon,
and sometimes a few of us still rise
when the latte order is called and our gently wrinkling
faces smile knowingly. Glitter wave
we all came out of so decisively,
we’re the Fosse dance in the musical that gets
revived in Summer Community Theater,
the cake still holding its layers in the rain,
the silver moon boot that flares
in the late October sky.