Bildungsroman as Slasher Movie

Beautiful was the slasher movie
of my youth: the tumultuous shadows

under my bedroom door, the floorboards
absorbing more than trauma,

the kitchen knife of moonlight
ready for its five minutes of fame.

Wes Craven couldn’t have done better
than the soundtrack of screams

recorded by the front door, the ficus
already succumbed to familial unhappiness,

the man with a melted face
kissing me goodnight, the lie

held tightly in his fist
like a decapitated canary.