You constructed a towering cathedral out of popsicle sticks
and blue Lego pieces, searching for deeper meaning
through building a foundation from discarded dreams
and stuttered melodies. I listened as you played folk and bluegrass covers on your acoustic guitar, wondering if we would ever cross our arms into a figure-eight on a rainy morning,
in the middle of a fire-fight between the Vietcong
and Francis Coppola.

Remember when we watched “Lost in Translation” and you asked did I feel isolated and anxious around large groups of white people? I wanted to nod, but instead
I smoked green out of an apple and ate the core,
as smoke lingered under my chin. You tapped my shoulder,
stared me down, and forced a grin, as though you knew
my answer would be nothing but manufactured nouns and verbs, gibberish, and Pig-Latin with no room for form, or design.

The sun belted heat rays down on our tired faces, stopping only
when a Mac Demarco song crooned from the boom-box on the
patio table and as we heard the beat and the lyrics,
we took shots of fireball and had a discussion on EDM festivals
and the rise of smartphones capturing moments of racism
and hatred with each video, each picture.

I wanted to read “Kafka on The Shore” to a six tennis players
from my country club, but they were too busy
staging a protest for an increase in minimum wage jobs
and besides Murakami spoke with a thick Japanese accent,
which turned off white people who revered his prose.
A shame you didn’t draw a faux Calvin and Hobbes
comic strip about Susi Derkins finding nirvana
in watching “Game of Thrones” while sleep-deprived
and eating half a bar of Xans. We drank the entire bottle
of Captain Morgan’s and still Drake’s Uncharted story mode
didn’t seem any less fascinating.

Your cousin Bonnie crashed
a white Ford Mustang into the back of U-Street Music Hall
and I cringed as I rode shotgun, the airbag releasing and smacking into my ruddy face, all the life I’d lived gleaming
beneath the shadowy figure I bought last weekend
at the thrift shop on West Broad Street.

You could have come over last Thursday to listen to
me play jazz on the piano for Epicure’s open mic night,
but you were too busy playing saxophone on the veranda
in Georgetown’s Waterfront and anyhow,
you wanted a relationship forged on trust and great ***,
and I could barely get out of my townhouse without
writing a diary entry etched in bone marrow and angel dust,
plus you told me, “I love your imaginary brother.”
And all I have is a teddy bear named Franklin.
You could have come over last Thursday to listen to
me play jazz on the piano for Epicure’s open mic night,
but you were too busy playing saxophone on the veranda
in Georgetown’s Waterfront and anyhow,
you wanted a relationship forged on trust and great ***,
and I could barely get out of my townhouse without
writing a diary entry etched in bone marrow and angel dust,
plus you told me, “I love your imaginary brother.”
And all I have is a teddy bear named Franklin.
You could have come over last Thursday to listen to
me play jazz on the piano for Epicure’s open mic night,
but you were too busy playing saxophone on the veranda
in Georgetown’s Waterfront and anyhow,
you wanted a relationship forged on trust and great ***,
and I could barely get out of my townhouse without
writing a diary entry etched in bone marrow and angel dust,
plus you told me, “I love your imaginary brother.”
And all I have is a teddy bear named Franklin.