All the boys she ever loved

Featured in

  • Published 20230801
  • ISBN: 978-1-922212-86-3
  • Extent: 200pp
  • Paperback (234 x 153mm), eBook

Michael Zanetti 

I remember the first one like I remember them all. This gangly little five-year-old making himself small in the backseat of the car, the middle seat a gap between him and Lacey as they talked on and off the whole drive about whatever it was five-year-olds talked about back then. He’d brought a small cloth bag with him, and he was showing her his action figures, these strong, poorly proportioned men with large heads and reluctant smiles. When we got to the house, I asked him to take off his shoes on the porch and he looked at me worried. 

Already a subscriber? Sign in here

If you are an educator or student wishing to access content for study purposes please contact us at griffithreview@griffith.edu.au

Share article

About the author

Jonathan O’Brien

Jonathan O’Brien is a writer, software developer and housing advocate. He was the recipient of a Brisbane Lord Mayor’s Young and Emerging Artists Fellowship...

More from this edition

All work and some play

In ConversationI’m often hearing about odd jobs that musicians or performers had and how it’s tied to their identity. You read about Beat writers like Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady, who really identified with blue-collar people and railroad workers. After Kerouac got infamous, or famous, he went off to be by himself in a cabin in the forest as a fire lookout. So he went into a very solitary existence, and I like that kind of thing...

Louche

Poetry On the bleached beachof café seats, he’s drenched, hairslicked, tarnished as tinespulled up from a shipwreck, savea naughty part:silver forelock a hookswaying as he...

Stay up to date with the latest, news, articles and special offers from Griffith Review.