Over the last few days
I have constructed a new basic description of myself:
I am the seventeen year old
poet with a white beard and baggy, bruised-looking eyes
who only ever uses his left hand when playing badminton.

I sit here for a second
staring, just staring
at the computer screen,
Nerves still chewing on my mind
and my stomach
in a way that's almost painful.
And then i stand and turn
and walk through the building
out the door
across the street
up the stairs
past the main building
up the side path next to the stairs
across the lawn
in the door
up more stairs
and into that dark corner
where i wait for everybody
so this creation,
the poetry club
can begin it's second meeting

First note of the year:
a small tan thing that falls to my desk from his hand.
I don't recognize the name
but I know immediately who and where she is.
He lets me out a minute early
as we're all congregated around the door
waiting, patiently for the bell.
I walk into the room
to find her jump roping
in a third floor classroom
at ten in the morning.
Her's is a face I have never seen
and her name is also unknown to me
as i the reason i'm here;
who told her about me.
but we talk for a few minutes
her words slurred almost unnoticeably by a slight southern accent
that makes me feel better about just sitting here and talking.
after ten minutes
a face familiar to both of us melts in through the doorframe
and we all talk
until a face all three of us know
also slinks in
and sits on the sofa
and our conversation continues
about everything,
and nothing,
and ourselves,
and everyone else.
the minutes creep by
and feel bad for not being in class
but this feeling, here
with a couple of good friends
and the short jump-roping lady with the slight southern accent
is peaceful,
and for the rest of the day
i'm calm and my thoughts are collected.
and a few of them
just a few
are questioning my future
thinking how great it would be
to be in her position;
in a room with people she knows
laughing, smiling, talking
and letting them leave
with smiles and calm thoughts.
more than traveling and meeting people,
learning their stories as I go;
this is where I belong
or is it?
I can't answer that
even with clear thoughts.

Someday I'll be able to-

Someday




©Brandon Webb
2012

she smiles minutely as i sit down
just enough for me to wonder
what's going on in her head
just enough to make me take
a few extra seconds to say anything
but we have a short conversation
at a table with other people
and before I leave
I realize
I've ended up breaking down
some huge walls for her;
she was the first sunset beach walk
I took with any girl,
the first time i decided
I would explain my feelings face to face,
and that same day
my first near-seizure
where i ended up flopping around on the floor
of the school bathroom, alone.
She was the first girl to invite me
to a party of any sort,
the first house other than mine I ever entered
the first family to adopt me.
four years and one girl has changed me so much
I think
as I walk back to class
as I do every second period,
I'm a creature of habit
and I thank anyone who has ever made me try anything new
and break them.




©Brandon Webb
2012

Sometimes it seems like the only emotion
I ever see 100% of the time
is nervousness.
I have become a master at finding
those little nervous ticks-
chewed fingernails
face scratching
the occasional repetition of one word or another
the occasional downward glance.
sometimes i wonder
if I'm making this girl
(whichever girl)
tick like a clock about ready to explode
and leave it's arms loosing lying upon me
it's innards lying there in front of me
the inner workings, the inner thoughts exposed.
Or if her mind is just wandering to others
and i'm just the one sitting here ,
hoping to find a clock,
never knowing if i have,
my heart beating violently in my chest,
my nails already bitten to nubs,
small holes on my face and neck
where I've scratched the hair off
my hair pushed and pulled
this way and that by nervous hands,
my head **** near exploding with the thought
"opposites attract, but i need a ******* clock
before i myself explode
leaving my arms hanging loose in the air
and my innards raw and exposed
for more than just a lovers eyes"




©Brandon Webb
2012

I type in that old address
expecting google not to show a house
to show the empty lot
that from what i heard
was the result of putting a dishwasher
into the kitchen
and causing complete septic failure
that flooded that entire uptown PA acre.
But, it flies me there
and I cry a little
because it's an old picture-
the house is still there,
just as i remember it;
an empty lot to the side,
the dilapidated apartment in the back yard,
the shed at the end of the driveway
(which was just a couple of cement tracks
slightly thinner than the pathfinder tires)
the apple and pie cherry trees we used to climb.
the alley in the back
where we used to skip rocks
and run from the neighborhood dogs (and cats)
looks the same as well,
every car the same,
every empty house still empty,
every tipped trashcan still being tipped each week.
I go down every street I used to walk,
they're all the same,
the bus stop is still where it was
the trails are just as long and dark as they ever were
and each yellow yard looks just as it always did in midsummer.
the ponds in the park are still the same color
with the same algae growing in them
and the same overgrowth hideaways around them.
A mile down the road;
the mini-mart where I bought gum when i had money
hasn't changed a bit,
even the pink umbrellas are still in front of the smoothie bar
but, across the street
the used book store that i would get lost in is gone
and from there i notice subtle changes:
the blackberry bushes by the middle school,
that mom made multiple cobblers from, are gone,
the maternity store moved,
the shed that my stepdad first told us would be our new house,
(before showing us this place)
has been torn down, or fell over
(as i assume it did),
and it doesn't end there,
I practiced my eye in the small details of this small ****** of the world
even though i never talked to anyone
in all the hours i spent walking.
But i guess I remember so well,
because, four-and-a-half years later
I still consider that house home.
that house where my brother was born,
where i first went without my glasses, and liked it
where I was first given the freedom of a bus pass
and permission to leave the house,
where i had my first (and only) overnighter
where i first became addicted to cleaning
where i've packed so many memories
that i can understand why the sewage line broke
sometime after that picture was taken



©Brandon Webb
2012

He says
"we're close enough, lets just go"
and i agree, reluctantly
so we take a right
after we climb the hill and take the trail.
we end up on the main road
and walking along the white line
on the right side
we pass a bus stop and apartment complex
before we cross
walk a block
and take two more trails.

he knocks
each knock lessening in volume.
she opens the door
ten years old and wearing a blue dress
her six year old brother charges past to hug me
and pulls me inside
but he's the only one truly greeting me
I can see i'm not truly welcome
not today
when they form the
"guests can only stay in the living room" rule
just for us.

we have a good time
as we always do
but i catch a couple glares
even as we all dance across the living room floor
to some nightcore song.

All because of some Facebook message
that in it's simplicity meant:

"people are *******
but there's in a beauty in you that's only in you.
a beauty made when chopping onions and potatoes
for some type of bean cookies
while screaming at your siblings in a mix of spanish and english,
a smile on your lips
even as you drag a protesting six year old
across wood floors and carpets
to sit him down in his room alone
for doing backflips off the couch and into the shoe rack.
there's nothing more beautiful than lips stretched across teeth
in just that way,
the skin around your eyes gently wrinkling a little
and your eyes themselves open, clear and aware.
that is where the strongest beauty lies,
in a smile
and yours appears in the most beautiful of places
and that to me is truly mesmerizing"

I summarized that thought to her, greatly
I apologized at the end
I even said (truthfully)
that she is a great friend
and a wonderful sister.

but i keep catching two or three glares on me
as i sit on the couch
her brother flopping around on my feet
glaring at his seven year old sister standing on the couch
behind me, laughing.

"this is my real home"
I think, for a second
as i always do when i'm here
but they glare at me, quietly, secretly
saying that it isn't
at least, temporarily
and I hope this bubbles over fast
but i'm glad my words are bubbling
she deserved them
for chopping onions on the table
and having to scream at five wild siblings
while their mother works.

she works so hard,
and her smiling face while doing so
is more beautiful than even i can tell her.

most nights I'll say to myself
"someday somebody will find her who sees how beautiful she is"
some nights I tell myself
"get off you lazy *** and take a chance, you're already here"
But today I'm just being glared at for trying




©Brandon Webb
2012