did i finally do it? geez.

I just saw a Shell commercial
of this girl riding
on the back
of some guy's motorcycle

and I could almost feel
the night air
see the lights of man
defying nature,
rushing by in a blur
when all that faces me
is the back of his neck

i don't notice my fingers
gripping themselves
laced and
wrapped,
straining muscles in my hands i didn't even
know i
had.

they'll hurt for the next three days,
my hands

and i only know because i asked for a ride
and soared through the warmth of the just barely summer
weightless and
rushing
on the birmingham bridge
skimmed right over
the birmingham bridge and

we never really talked again,
only shared that momentary
closeness of my chest against your back,
mine weighed down with the books of both our backpacks
but free as the wind in my pigtails

we never really
talked again
but everytime i see
that liquid motion, feel the pavement melt away beneath me
i'll always remember
the heat.

poetry is symptomatic of a life riddled with life. i can't really doubt myself, but you--

[lucky me
can't you see
i'm in love?]

i really thought you were
really somethin
else when you told
me that you liked frank sinatra.

how many guys
this day, this time
would ever say such a thing...mean such a thing...

and then you sang
"you're nobody 'til somebody loves you"

and that's when i knew
what you'd never know

that's when i knew
you were lying--
that it'd never be that easy

moon beams can only reach so far into
the woods.

i waited all my life to be here with you tonight

you played me that song
like it stood for for
ever
when really it stood
til you found someone better

...yourself.

((maybe he was onto

something)).