Poem for Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Nineteen Ninety-Seven

There was the time we sat on some brick steps
with an empty glass bottle between us. We
used it as a makeshift ashtray while cars with
broken mufflers shot north, while honeybees
selectively pollinated the hydrangeas, while
sweat greased the backs of our knees. You
asked me where I came from, so I said look
around, this is it, this is where I come from;
the highway in front of us, the pine sap
dotting the old Chevy. The red shutters, the
empty window boxes, the cloud formations
above proclaiming blood wars and summer
storms. I confessed to you the time I trapped
a bumblebee inside a mason jar turned
upside down against the grass and watched
it orbit frantically until it suffocated and the time
I ripped an earthworm in half before drowning
it in a five-gallon bucket of faucet water. I
have not played god since nineteen ninety-seven
but where do you come from, I asked. You
pointed towards a random spot, a random set
of coordinates in the atmosphere, indicating
you did not expect me to understand. It began
to drizzle then