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saige May 2018
Two years, you spent eyeing
Those boots on your feet
Finally, you got them
One week
Before bootcamp

This morning,
You wore a cap without a tassle
And a tie full of flags
Our nation's colors
Bled through your gown

So stand now,
Beneath this pool hall light
So I can memorize
That crooked swirl in your hair
Little black whirpool
I never knew was there

"I never knew my hair was this dark,"
You told me, once
"Until I left California"

Sometimes I forget
You left your mother and surfing
And picked up bass fishing
And skate boarding
A few friends
And shooting pool
And now you're leaving this
To learn to shoot a rifle

Seventeen and you already
Know how to live

Congratulations
Farewell
My favorite Marine
You hug me
And you smell like cologne
And after two years
Of knowing you in Carolina
I don't know why
That surprises me
my brother's best friend
saige May 2018
my grandpa never smoked
but he worked in a tobacco factory
for thirty years
and one day,
on a wall of a bathroom stall
in that tobacco factory
he saw something scribbled
so he copied it down
on a napkin, he said
then carried that napkin in his pocket
until it fell apart
twenty years later

yesterday,
my brother wore a cap and gown
and gramps gave him a card
in which he'd scribbled down
"success is getting what you want
happiness is wanting what you get"
then he drove back to the cabin
in the foothills, where he lives
and my brother lit a cigarette
saige May 2018
your name, our love
etched into my brain
no
for 'twas what
chiseled me away
saige May 2018
this is not a drill
just a miracle
we don't need wings
he has sunshine hair
and sky blue eyes
and they are falling
on me
saige May 2018
stolen
mona
least
i
can
be
the
angel
in
the
marble
you
can't
set
­free
saige May 2018
weeks without
winking
won't sleep til she's
perfect...
you said
and
(you're still screaming)
saige May 2018
did you sign it?
did they buy it
didn't drive you mad?
did you give it all you had
and will you ever
get it back?
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