scenes from summer, june 17-29

1.
two nights later and still there is glitter on my chest,
a speck of shining green in harsh bedroom light.
and in a cheap mirror, my eyes
have connotations of defiance
that I never could have read there two years ago.
I feel like a dictionary revised in lipstick,
or in a child's messy crayon,
old fears still visible through bright new color.

2.
light slid onto your face, and for that brief illumination,
three quarters of a moment,
you looked like a firefly.
it would be so hard to chase and catch you
and hold you in my humid hands,
you disappear too quickly
in the rain-softened dusk.

3.
I can hear you singing
perfectly out of tune,
standing behind me just out of sight.
We lean into the music like a grateful friend.

4.
I remember the taste of golden streetlights circling against a dark sky,
I remember the sound of a sugarcoated midnight
bouncing off fresh white cinderblocks.
I remember bittersweet tattooing my heart until you
can barely read the names there anymore,
smeared blurs of tears and joy.  Oh, God,
I have missed you so much.

5.
I have missed you so much.
State lines and long-distance phone calls
have gotten to know me well,
we shake hands on Saturday nights
when I am lonely and you are alone.

6.
Sadness reaches for your face
like a lost child.
What you tell me is unfathomable,
like the bottom of a canyon or your ninety-ninth birthday.
It is as impossible as tears on Christmas Day,
as improbable as an explosion of the sun.
We watch possibilities drift away like clouds.

7.
I am scared of wasting my time here.
Memories lose their color faster than chalk washes away in the rain,
and soon the details will rinse from their stains on my skin,
but scars remain.  Marks of promises, marks of love.
I will come back, you say,
I swear to you I will come back.
But you don't,
and we readjust as if a part of home has disappeared,
as if we are half gone ourselves.