skip to main |
skip to sidebar
my best summer was my worst summer.
i'd ride from garfield to uptown
stop at wendy's for scalding coffee
carry it on my bike
to duquesne and that bar class
sit through lectures, estates and trusts,
corporations, contracts and torts
looking at the back of your head
smelling your ponytail
(but you never turned around)
pedal downtown to the arts festival
soak it in, summer art and people
lunch with ani difranco on that tiny stage
burnt-out car sculpture
shouting all that violence
then up up up the long long hill
l o n g h i l l
past churches, gas stations, bars
studying people on the cathedral lawn
reading in a carrel at hillman library
perched with coffee at the beehive
freedom in unstructured summer hours
i went with her a few times
what did she like? the park with the lake
melissa etheridge (i didn't)
weird hair and rings on toes
most interesting, her artist father
and the other, who loved me
and the other, who followed me
drunk kissing
and you. always you.
we took our test and i ran away.
when you called me out from exile
i thought i'd lose my mind
you, calling me, in my solitude?
but you had to tell me about the dean
trying to keep us from the bar
"bad moral character"
we had to find lawyers and respond
your next call shocking me out of seclusion
you had crashed
your car skidding on slippery pavement
into that group of children on bikes
a child died. a child died.
your photo in the newspaper
the bandage condemning you
the child's mother damned
a child died.
how much could you take?
i came home to your solitude
in your sweltering apartment
unable to be witnessed
that summer evening on your rooftop
sitting quietly with the weight
nothing to say
all i knew to do to care for you
right there on your rooftop
binding me to you again
destined
in that best of worst of summers.