Memories

I see yellow lemon light in front of me,
Spilling on the floor, in shards like glass,
My halcyon days.

I’m going to let myself remember, today:
All the shitty spoofs on youtube,
Chanting jokes like a religion,
Puddles under the breezeway.
“The only two who might accept it,”
A nauseating DVD, a ceiling fan,
The red letters on the slideshow.
The war I was so glad was over.
Every laugh and every doodle,
Oreos and OCD-ness,
Meatball hair and manga sections,
The pledges and the pleadings
That never sank into you—

The second year is fuzzy now.
I remember faces, places, trees,
Fur on our hoods. Dress-shopping,
Hit on as we flurried up the steps,
Feet, cockroaches, and atom bombs,
Eyes-rolling,
Heads-rolling, tears-rolling,
Choking on your apathy, your laziness,
Your utter lack of caring, knowing, reaching,
Your selfish, cowardly refusal
To ask why your best friend is crying.

I remember a dark night at an ice cream shop
Where I lost the friends dearest to me.
A car launched itself off the curb at them—
Or at least that’s as hard as I took it.
I walked the halls with the ghosts,
More and more silently, silently, silently,
As I also was washed, wept away,
As the fog filled my head and swept over my eyes,
As my heart and my mind spluttered and crashed,
As I shook and I gagged there in front of them—

As I flailed for a voice oh-so-passively
And they told me I had nothing to say.