Florida Again
I
forgave myself for having had a youth.
—Thom Gunn
At the Fashion
Square mall,
back
of Waldenbooks,
I saw my younger self
haunting
the magazine rack.
Ripping out pages
of Blueboy,
tucking them
in a Trapper
Keeper.
Turn back.
His eyes met mine,
animal
and brittle,
a form
of gratitude
that a man
kept his stare.
Any man.
I half-smiled
some admission,
and though
he couldn’t
see it coming,
I excused him
his acid jeans;
two Swatch
watches,
two guards.
He, I,
must have been
nineteen:
sex was “safer”
then—
scribbles
on the mall
men’s room stall;
malaise
of saxophone
and PSAs.
How
did I
even
learn how to live
in 1991?
Landlocked,
cock-blocked,
Spanish moss
festering.
I forgive him.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.