They, do they realize I have had the same friends for 20 years now
And that inevitably we have stumbled through youth together
oscillating like sonic waves
closer, further,
sawtooth
we have been human
humanness so imperfect that we hurt one another with our carelessness
but they always stay there in discomfort with me
on park bench
in grocery parking lots
in side streets alley and took responsibility
their action
and allowed me the chance to speak the them and atone to mine

they might think it was impatience, immaturity, abandonment but
it was love this great big leap of love for myself that I took
this courageous willingness to state what friendship meant to me
and when it fell upon deaf ear

I could see him standing again in the alley “ saying we have nothing to be sorry” or something fuzzy that resembled nothing to say sorry about.

Did he not understand I had sold all my belonging, moved across the world to stand there, did he not see my naivety, my willingness and my faith in him, my wild belief that I could break any norm,

Did I not see this heavy wistfulness, my lack of love that I would bet my life on crumbs, on song that promised love, did I not see that two others a woman and girl might deserved to wake up to who they loved, did I not see all the ****** up swirling dysfunction in my head,


The last time I came to see him,
I smiled because he is so good at what he does. He radiates.

–And I thought of the troublesome times I have come to see my dearest friends through my short life
and how they and I
–we stood there in discomfort but finally patched it up,
took the muck and held it. Tried
got angry, cried, asked for forgiveness, or stood silently until we could agree to meet again, until slowly we could atone
The gift of friendship that we always offered after mistake and mistake–


But he left ...
and I kept dancing at least there was music playing

At least my intention was to liberate
, to come and to see someone
look at them as something more that a fiction of imagination, see them with flesh and blood and not keep them clouded villainous or a story too skewed in my mind  

and if my intention got stuck under sheets of thoughts and misunderstanding over lack of phrasing, over more of youthful stumbling it is because it comes with the territory of being this young, this tender, this foolish, this whole bag of everything that is me
and i am not ashamed of every mistake I have made
slowly I am learning
appreciating friendships
the renewed bonds
The 5 years, the ten years, the 15 years, the 20 year long connections I have worked with all my might to feed with devotion
passed all my insecurities, past all my self doubt, past my own pride, past my self to see them standing then just as they are