Question from a Bowl of Beans

A bite of beans, a long milk draw and thena side glance: "What's it like to be a boy?"she asked. Tiresias first came to mind,the mating snakes he struck, the female dead,his seven years in women's form that followed.Didacticism at its worst, I thought,especially how to explain his lieto Hera, pleasures of the wee and woo,and homosocial bonds, the kindof myth an eight-year-old like mine would digthen dig at me until I broke, explaining different partsand dumbass boys, the birds and bees. My wifewas teaching dance that night and would have struckme blind if I had gone that way. Instead,I merely said, "It ain't that bad," a lie,of course, then took another bite of beans."The penis seems to be a lot of trouble,"she said while looking down into her bowl.And once again, I thought, deflect. I couldbring Nana into play, tell how at eightI told my class about my front-tail, unzippedmy pants to show them when they said I lied,Miss Walker's scream, the long walk down the hall,how Nana let me think I had a tail for years,until that day when I walked home and Daddytold me about the penis, its stiff-tailed ways.I knew "it ain't that bad" would hardly do for this.I said, "You're right—it is a lot of trouble."