broken bones, I know your body is pain

let the night be dark
you won’t forget your light on

woodsmoke, fall air
I know you ain’t used to it
empty cabinets, fingers over
father’s strings
I know you ain’t used to it

let the night be dark,
you won’t forget to leave your light on

The next morning I awoke early, dreadful breathing sighs into chamomile tea. I walked to work, tears breaking as waves. Later we drove to the site of your crash, where your family was already gathered. The sun was high and hot. We listened and walked as members of your tribe lead us from the end point, where your car came to rest. Back through where you tumbled and spit shards of glass and plastic, back, back where the grass was barely bent, to where you swerved off Old Olympic Highway. There weren’t even marks on the road. Back to the point where twenty-feet-further-you-wouldn’t-have-rolled. And we faced your mother while elders sang your spirit safely to the other side. I saw you laying in the field, pulling up grass and laughing.

I was dehydrated and head throbbing, numb. Oren bought us sandwiches and drove us to a bluff where we sat in the open hatchback shaded by trees. He made jokes and distractions; scooping up pebbles of time, and tossing them gently behind me.

thank you for the only slightly windy beach
the barefootable sand, plentiful and randomly clapping barnacles
piles and piles of grooved blue muscles
we could eat forever

thank you for the dog dates,
naked board games, work visits and beer
thank you for taking me shooting up Black Diamond Road
and for letting me decide not to shoot

thank you for the warm bed,
the slugs and the frogs at night
thank you for braiding my hair, and talking shit

thank you for the empty house to write in
even though I didn’t write.

marvin,
thank you for the memory

love, gardens

It was winter and summer at once. I hopped over little piles of snow, crunching ice. It was a beautiful day, and a clear night. We ducked and slid under a porch and crouched in the cool dirt. Sun and grass poked through the spaces between the wood, we were hidden away from the bustling neighborhood. I touched your arm. Your skin was golden and soft. You look fit, I said. You told me you’d been having sex on top of books. It’s been so long, ten years. We’re completely different people I suppose, I smiled and sat with my back against the house. You looked at me, so familiar. You leaned in to kiss me, laughed and our teeth clanked together.

I woke up this morning and a piece of my tooth had chipped off.