we drift in and out.
Tag: friendship
-
immersion.
another night of youth
wasted.
on the walk from the bars we kicked rocks and whined aloud
at the fickleness of our latest crushes. stewing over the injustice of it all.
my porchlight was tucked into the alley you'd continue down;
we'd reach it in a few more dark jokes,
wave, smile,
shout good wishes to the sound of my turning key.
i don't know who said something first;
i don't know if we said anything at all.
only that suddenly there was the flavor of your grin
the rough of five o'clock shadow pushing three am.
it was all so luxuriously simple,
so naturally unfussy -
we'd loved others before
we'd love again but for now
we were sticking middle fingers up and tongues out to Big Lonely.
fingertips swirling conspiratorially across thighs,
lips playing house against collarbones;
the assuaging breaths between bouts
hanging from the corners of the room, our canopy of relief.
there was the smallest sense of wrong in how right we blended,
stunning how we dissolved one another into puddles then giggles -
a spice i relished as i fancied myself recklessly daring.
i wasn't of course.
falsely audacious about everything,
i bet safe; i bet you.
because in even the smallest of things, you treasure - that's what i'd love about you
for years to come
as we each went about our lives, the easiest semisecret i've ever kept
(it was too fun to watch our friends' jaws drop, who could resist)
all of it
faded
so far into the distance now
nothing but depth patinaed into dark joke filled reunions.
-
a prayer.
magic, the way the backseat bench can never quite hear what the front cab is saying.
we were packed into the car like sardines
fivefriendssuitcasesbackpackspurses
snacks held out, passed around, remnants scattered between us.
but i heard you
even on the diagonal
my knees propped against the drivers seat back
chuckling softly “we’re really livin’ now, eh?”felt you say it, more like,
same as the hush that falls when all the windows are rolled down.
never came up with a new term for that, did we?
what a legacy
those Oldsmobile knobs
hitching, always in the same two places, against the strain of leather siding
as if they actually coiled glass onto itself.
magic,
if you let yourself believe.
“sure seems that way” i said, distracted,
imagining the windows rolling so far the car transformed into a topless Wrangler;
the wind whipped wash of calm,
the inextricable undercurrent of terror.
the sudden awareness of how fast you are moving,
of how little there is to protect you;
the hesitant trust placed in every passing stranger,
the blanket of zen, however meager, that no matter what so much is outside of your control.
“oh shit! got it back!”
the satellite gods had finally found us weaving between the mountains,
rained their manna, databytes, reassurance we’d survive.
curiosity my well documented master, i pulled myself up
wrapped my arms around the driver headrest.
together we watched the map reload on the center console,
some fortunetelling talisman with a modern mouthpiece,
“for-ty – min-utes – to – des-tin-a-tion”
“oh. we’re halfway there.”
i met your rueful smile with a nose scrunch, my lips sealed against the crook of my right arm, longing suddenly
acutely
for the uncertainty of the last half hour;
the disorientation of feeling lost in varying degrees
already logged nostalgically as some mad adventure.my chin rested atop my elbow now.
“yeah, forty more.
and even that’ll take some luck.”
-
electricity.
a heavy evening rain rose as a loaded fog,
cloaked us like a dimming theater light.
grateful for an excuse to hush under the guise of proper manners
we sat shoulder to shoulder, our eyes focused safely in the distance,
unsure exactly the show to follow but knowing with certainty
that it was starting.
just for the fun of it, i turned your smile over in my lap until it softened,
bated your breath,
sparked flint against the base of my own spine.
i fancied an impossibility
that this moment was inevitable, found myself shuffling through versions
of the vastly different people we could have arrived to it as.
after all,
what were we but shoe boxes full of trading cards shelved at our childhood homes,
each bearing our face with different uniforms, records?
what more had we done to reach right now but closed our eyes, stuck our hands in, and plucked one out?
i thought
how easy it is, to burn a box of cardstock.
the plastic coating would add an edge of stubbornness
clinging to its former form
before giving way
curling into a puff of black smoke.
-
weatherman.
i remember the air was balmy before we knew him. desperate for a breeze we'd throw open every window - dance, sweaty and barefoot, on an oak floor decades our senior. something powerful and ancient came screaming out when we gathered: chanting songs that reminded us of being young (chart toppers from three summers ago) throwing our arms up, out, around each other (the joy was too big to hold on our own) innocence sloshing rhythmically 'round the rims of our cups (three girlish grins colluding with six batting eyelashes to escape the consequence of some small town barkeep; "my sir, i've no idea! that pink lemonade really got mixed up with the wrong crowd!") it was so hard to notice at first - you, adultily checking the weather each day, to help decide whether it'd be cold without a jacket, when to leave to beat the rain. the world spun slowly on an axis of frilly distractions: for us - a creaky maple porch swing and worn dive bar jukeboxes and whirling around the front lawn with boys, for you - the weatherman, who had you lagging behind to apply sunscreen, to fiddle with your thermostat until it was just right. as the air cooled around us, between us, the checks kept piling up. bit by bit, you transformed beneath his radar. whether to wear that outfit, what activities would be appropriate to do; the whetherman guided your when, your what, your wear. snow fell. you bundled up. our toes froze stubbornly in high heels. it grew so bad near Christmas we tore up the floorboards, "to keep it warm in here" he said. each taking shifts to silently stoke the open flames, our planks of red oak burning to a bright cherry, a blackened mahogany, ash. dawn broke. you stood to fill the glasses, a muscle-memory intimacy interrupted by a brow furrow - our lemonade was suddenly plain. the last stubborn embers crackled television static through the stillness. i looked up at the funeral pyre in the middle of our living room and suddenly understood the term "meteorologist." he'd collided into the group of us and blown everything recognizable to pieces.
musée 