In memory of M.A.E. (1977-1998)


I am not crying, I’m writing about it—
watching you projected
by the rewind button in my mind
as if my eyes were the lights on Douglas Road
the night you spun
out of my life,
like the silk-spun web of an injured spider,
translucent beauty hanging
by a single thread.
I wanted to walk into you that day,
past the white walls and
through the intravenous web,
the soft shield that broke you.
The irony of my birthday
concurrent with your death,
your last breath.

I think of nights in June
as we dove like drunken birds
into the white foam of our youth,
vulnerability sticking to us like salt.
I can taste an ocean welling beneath my skin,
still smell you and the cracked leather of your Chevy’s worn seats.

I am not crying, but I will tell you about those nights
and how you held us together
before we all came apart like band-aids
in water. But the gray sticky stuff remains.

It clings where the skin is still soft.

06/22/2005

Author's Note: (Inspiration-Crying by Richard Blanco)

Posted on 06/23/2005
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