Tennis is the only part of Rayna’s life
that seems real, the only time
when she can exist, react, slam all her feelings
Through her chest and down her arm—
no hesitation, no thought, just pure instinct,
the moment right in front of her,
the grunt escaping her throat
as she sends the ball crashing
just out of her opponent’s reach,
the only thing she can ever ace.

Ironically it’s her mother
who first put a racket in her hand
and showed her how to use it—
Forehand, backhand, slice, smash.
Rayna has trouble believing
this simple fact whenever Mom
critiques everything she does
off the court, whenever she tells
her to calm down, to think
before she speaks, to change
the way she looks or acts or exists.
It’s the ultimate puzzle how
this woman who is so infuriating
also gave Rayna the best gift
of her fifteen-year existence:
the ability to lose herself in a game.

Rayna doesn’t always win,
but it doesn’t matter.
The arc of her opponent’s serve,
the rhythm, the topspin—
it’s all part of some grand dance
that has seeped into her blood,
tingled against her nerves,
attached itself to her DNA,
replicating until she’s one
with the racket, the net, the court itself.
If she could just stay on that court
forever she would be nothing
but focused and brilliant as she performs
the improvised choreography
of this game her mother gave her.

She wishes she could find
a way to tell Mom this,
to express how much she loves her,
how much she hates her,
how much she knows
that her faults and talents alike
come from her. Maybe
if she could just get Mom back
on the court with only the net
between them, she could explain.
But her mother refuses to play her now
that she can no longer be guaranteed a win.

***

Valerie Hunter teaches high school English, and has had stories and poems in publications including Paterson Literary Review, Sonder, Room, and Frost Meadow Review.