In sixth grade, we dipped strips of newspaper into pails of starch and water, removed the excess paste with our fingers, and laid the coated rags, one by one, over the wire frame of an elephant taller than we were. We’d smooth out the wrinkles until our hands blackened with newsprint. Later, we lacquered the grey hulk, thumping the hollow of his belly for its boom. We won the contest: Largest mammal.
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Inside the body of a bird, a young girl breathes in flour, water, and freshly swathed paper. At the Tecate Port of Entry, two men break her open. No sticks, blindfolds, or trinkets. Her legs spill from the half-bird. Her brother is found under a fold-down seat; their mother in the trunk.
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It is my son’s first birthday. We swing a piñata from the awning, spin blindfolded children until they’re reeling. He won’t remember the plastic bat bearing down on Elmo’s face, the sudden sprawl of fruit-flavored candy and gum, or how we split that red-fringed shape in two.