i.
and love and you. i loved your old car, and your name for it. it was so clever. you're so clever and unique and i'm holding your hand and we're unique. what do you mean? i mean, we're different from the rest. we just are. we have to be. because it's you and me. and rainy cities at night aren't sloppy and slushy and blurry and grey. they're beautiful blue. deep blue, mazarine blue, and the street lights are backdrops for our shadows. our shadows and the puddles in the street. we walk through the puddles and you don't mind, because you like my rain boots. and i like you. your eyes are big and brown and sweet and round, and i'm looking at you, and you're looking at me. because here's looking at you when we fall onto the sand at the beach it's okay because when we fall, we fall together and that is our streetlight manifesto.

ii.
when i walk through a new city at night, it's full of noise and movement. but i am alone. i pass quickly by. i pass old streetlights and memories. i close my eyes and blink away it all. i don't go to the beach anymore. the sand fills my shoes and it rubs at all those old memories. and old cars seem like they really only belong in movies. and now i collapse onto just a bed in a building.

iii.
knowing more and thinking different. because you are different. shyer and sweeter but with the shaky hands i seem to be drawn to. and i draw you. and i on a park bench singing songs from bands we pass from ear to ear. candy wrappers at the library and frosties past my twelve. this is different and i am older. you are not him. and i know you and i know differently now. but you are familiar like the rainy roads i’ve always sped down and you are sweet like the candy you keep in your pockets. i'm going to try to inhale you all at once.

iv.
it hurt so much. so differently than ever before.

v.
you were unlike the rest. and by the rest, i only mean two.
you weren't very quiet. and you were suspicious of everyone
the first time i saw you look at me. and i mean
right
at
me
you thought you took me all in, in that moment. but i was the one who took you in, all of you, completely, for good.

vi.
for you, i was a shadow. i am your shadow; i am always here for you, and also always here behind you. i can no longer say i’m older and know better with pride. when i say i'm older, it escapes as a sigh when i look out of my new window into the same rainy streets. i have less to say but more to remember. like where i have to draw the line. when i am drawn to you but now when i draw a line i don’t draw you.