Float

Floating down
Floating down
A tease and a dare
Young again, but

Aware

You were all tipsy
We were all exposed as
September’s sun

Lost in words and
Braided hair and
How carelessly brave

How carelessly brave
When we leapt off the cliff

I felt almost naked
Almost afraid
As we compared our tattoos

Pentagonal, like a starfish,
As I leapt from rope and tire
Piercing the surface

Piercing my mind
With orchestral landscapes of serenity
Just the creek and me

Entranced in awe,
Overwhelmed, even,
Aware of every living thing
Cast in green majesty

You said I command a room
You were silent when I spoke on the bus

Alive, so
Alive in my
Fingertips, so
Alive I want to
Burst like the buds

I couldn’t bottle it up

We poured oil on our kayaks and
Aimed our bows
Drawn in cryptic farewell

‘Til time next
(But never again)

Maybe you knew that
As you sat obstinate on the bank

Outrunning the sunset
Close again to close friends
Outrunning the sunset
Now caricatures of who we were

Still, with an arm on my neck
A kiss atop my skull

Still, catching you by the shoulders
Catching you in my eyes
Catching all of the ghosts

Still, the bond that mends
I can pretend
I can pretend

The Used in your stereo
We cried out, over and over,
“I’ll savor every moment of this.”

Locked now in a locket
Or placed in a file
Closed in a drawer
Lost in the pile