on certain days
i feel the rain swallow me whole
wet blades of grass in my sneaker
laugh at each step that i take in the wrong direction
i'm 17, and i spend a lot of time thinking about his spine
how his voice sounds deeper
when i hear it in my sleep
which is to say
that things still manage to morph themselves beyond recognition
even when they aren't real
i'm 17
and i love poetry
because it allows me to narrate
things
even when they aren't real
like
it is through the graces of some god
that my shoulder blades still sit parallel to the ground beneath me
as if to say
you
are real
even when not pressed under the weight of his advances
even when you lay
in the stomach
of the rain