We build ourselves a castle somewhere
by the Caspian Sea. You write me poetry
and I paint you watercolors. We stage
our one-act plays and roll gracelessly,
stealing things we can afford.
How we steal peaches and mangos
from the marketplace and
pass them between bites: my mouth
the perfect replacement to yours.
We suck lollipops on the playground
and laugh without quite knowing why.
Untouchable, giggly, we slap
the mosquitoes that want a taste
of our paradise and laugh at ourselves
for leaving the towels by the pool
every time. They say we are being lousy
teenagers and we smile at them.
And when the sun sets and turns
our still-burnt skin pink, we squeeze
our hearts and pray to fireflies
and comets that we never split up.
No, we are too good friends, and
the summer is too alive, and
the fading light is shining through
the grass too beautifully for that.
Against the torpid whirs and murmurs
of such a scene, you beckon me to
listen close with one powerful sweep
of the arm, and you declare it to be
a la niña summer, long nights
and short days. “These only come
every 4 years, you know,” you hush
officiously. You tell me the daylight
won’t last and I pretend to be sad
while the clouds roll past our heads
and everything sighs— how dirt sticks in
damp clusters under our toes. But I can’t
wait to raise my tired fingers and trace
the muscles of every constellation.
Looking back, you aren’t quite
right about that. This summer
has lasted far too long, has haunted
the west every year since the Jurassic,
and broken friendships boast an even
more illustrious history. But that
doesn’t matter. It is intoxicating to think
that in our young lives, we might get
the sort of magical golden summer
that comes once in every 4 years,
the type that graces the memories of
writers and smiling seniors alike.
We fill brown paper bags with unripe fruit,
tearing off leaves that blink like human eyes.
We crush flowers in between our teeth,
the two of us whose bodies have
no sweetness. Stale coca-cola,
warm milk and honey dripping
down our throats. We undress and
dance under the pink clouds, where
the cotton curtains are still closed,
blush and bashful. Spring has
disintegrated, the heat coils
in the wind. I feel the veins inside
my chest pulsing, wrapping around
every bone of my skeleton. Waltzing on
that road too long, how the radio snags
on a wave and the sky catches vermillion
fire, electric and strange. Even if it came
with the static noises of a chaotic
harmony of naivety, that was okay—
we were happy to claim it as the
soundtrack of our prime regardless.
They say we are wasting our lives,
letting days pass us by. The flowers fade
like pastel paintings. Parasites chew
the still water we hold our breath under.
Through summer skies, sunlight berates
the fibers of our lollipops melting near the
playground, collapsing into a dirty pool
of color and sweetness.
