We’ve long sloughed off our innocence,
our bodies smooth
with something akin
to self-assuredness
And wouldn’t you know it,
the way we carry ourselves,
Spines straight,
gripping the slim stems
of wine glasses,
Balmy rooftop air
and polite conversation
smiles stretched across our faces
like cling wrap
as we toast to summer
Clink.
To those long gone days
Of scraped knees
And muddy fingernails
Of swinging with our feet
Aimed square at the sky
Convinced of our own infinity
And nobody ever told us,
“This time will be the last time.”
And so we went on carrying
the names of our childhood friends
On the tips of our tongues,
Ready to be yelled
At a moment’s notice
Thrown into the wind
like a fastball,
Life
comes at you. Clink.
Never thinking one day how
our mouths will stumble over
The shapes of their names
Thick and unfamiliar
Like the vague memory of dad
packing away your scooter
for the summer
Every summer, until one day
You stop asking for it
And nobody ever tells you,
not when the sun is this high in the sky,
And your eyes are wide
But not wide enough to see
What that blurry spot is
on the horizon,
what it is
to grow up.
And nobody ever tells you,
that if you close your eyes now
Just as the sun slants to caress
the length of your face
You can almost hear the name
your mother called out
to beckon you home
at the tail end
of an endless day.
