Before we tip any vinyl albums
from their cardboard sleeves,
our dance coach demands
one hundred sit ups.
The basketballs tut
next door.
Another coach
bellows.
I cradle my head
in my hands
and fold myself
into myself,
a gardener lost
in upending pots,
guiding tendrils
to climb. I am almost
done when, I feel
a nudge, a cat’s
paw. In my top-secret
self, a self I know
barely. A pounce.
A tussle. Then petals
gush from every
voodoo nerve.
The dancer who
weights my feet
says, My.
Turn.
"My First Orgasm" won the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poetry's 2021 Triad Contest, as well as Council of Wisconsin Writers 2021 Niedecker Poetry Award Honorable Mention. This poem and others can be found in Lora Keller's as-yet-unpublished collection, Meticulous Ardor: Meditations on Basketball and the Milwaukee Bucks, which is a tribute to basketball – the players, the arena, even the jerseys—and how the sport unites us.
To learn more about Lora Keller please visit lakeller.com
