i am lying on my stomach
after having spent hours propped up on my elbows
spent hours reading, sunbathing
spent hours getting drunk and tired in the sun
i am outside our new chicago home
in a courtyard belonging to only us
i am sprawled on the transparent blue plastic of my past
the cerulean beach chair that never made it to a single beach.
its plastic wound and woven around the metal
like nothing i’ve ever seen before
and i fall asleep
and i’m awakened by the raindrops on the low of my bare back
but it is not raining
and i wake up naked, inside, in your arms as you tap out a tune on me
and the blue chair that we put in the shower
when my brother was too weak to stand
because my brother was too weak to stand
is nowhere to be found
even when he went to live in the hospital
that chair
gathered rust
in a closed, dripping shower
we threw it out
it reminded us of a hard time
he was our only surviving souvenir
i miss the chair
and i miss the person he was before it all
before he gathered all this rust