Let's pull those knees close,
and think of childhood.
We were fragile beings of light.
Now we're heavy black glasshouses
throwing skipping rocks in the dark.
I wish I went to sleep-away camp,
like all the cool kids.
I could skip rocks,
and learn slip knots,
and maybe how to swim.
Sit by campfire
and tell scary stories,
and spill my first kiss
as the truth in a guts game.
"It was third grade.
She was a ******* girl-
and we wanted to practice
for our shared boy crush.
Baby tongues danced
and I just liked it more than I should have."
And then someone would
douse the flames
with a bucket of lake water,
to put an end to the horror.
Today she's having a baby,
and we haven't spoken
since grade school.
I wonder if she ever reads my poetry.
The kids would have teased me.
Or perhaps never believe me.
The holes keep getting bigger.
They let the light in from outside.
Let's let our knees go.

you robbed me,
at the tender age
of non-consent and
bony knees from
something i will
never win back

and i'm not
talking about
virginity anymore

my father told me that i looked like a mental institution
with sleep and sea-salt in my hair
sipping strawberry lemonade in the backyard
high on insulin
your tongue is wry like chalk
when you swallow sad boy symphonies
stumbling in your own vision of paradise
cooking up a dream with your head inside your heart
they heard what you said, once the herd was gone
i'm the only one who reminds you of lost days
you said that this was what you liked about me most
lost cause-poetry
don't blow up my garden
you can't even make it snow in july

*(k.w)