(it was cantaloupe, honey dew melon, prosciutto, fresh mozzarella, and arugula.)

we are just a bunch of memories. everything we’ve been informs everything we are. i am 3 and 9 and 16 and 23 and 42. i am sweater pants, smooshed frogs, banana seat, sunday school dresses, and the smell of railroad ties. cantaloupe will always be the color of my first bedroom. sundays evenings will always taste like buttery french bread wrapped in tin foil, sound like MUZAK, feel like air conditioner cold skin. the nighttime sirens and trains and sprinklers on timers will always go back to that one night, that every night, of that one time before whenever that was. you will always make me smile and he will always make me want to lay in the dark and listen to music and cry. the music will take me anywhere but here. i am poetry, way up high in your loft bed, falling face down on the pavement. even when i am in the backseat at the drive-in watching grease, in the backseat holding your hand, in the backseat my face pressed against the window going everywhere. the lady i only knew for one night told me things i’ll never remember. important things that are now more feelings than real words i can speak. like the long walk from there to here. like the staticky sound of being alone. like the way blackbirds and roller rinks and standing up there reading are right now, this moment and forever.