The Juice of What Was
Wondering to what forms
the green grapes and cantaloupe
of that perfect day
have now decomposed and
scattered.
What is there left for me to love?
I love the juice of what was.
Still tarting a region of my tongue
when I bite it by accident
and feel the stab of you.
I love the unspoken feeling
and, less so, the language
I desperately arrive at
regarding it.
If I were to skin my knee
continuously
along the trailer park sidewalk
spanning Keego Harbor—
where we once floated
like mercury on heat
a perfect summer element—
then I could feel it again
more acutely
than if I were to, say, list
every business establishment
linking that distance.
I do wish
though
that
instead of cells
my body were the connection
of nail salons
coney island restaurants
optometrist offices
pet groomers
and the gas station
(the nearest one, that
I loved so much [prior to
renovation—
where the bathroom
was identical
to the domestic ones
in our
uniform
neighborhood
adjacent]).
I will always love
the things I ever loved.
My love for my world
local and enormous
cools unconsciously there
face-down
on the wetted tiles
of my father's bathroom
(the larger one, clean
as it was [when my mother
still lived there]).
Let me die on that
midnight bathroom floor
in the lovely world
stilled and frozen
with perfection.
I will be reborn instantly
from a mysterious litter
inside the cabinet beneath
the sink.
Like Teemu—
slick with birth
in the Vankers' mud-room
turtle
sandbox
I will exit and love it all
with newborn
blinded
eyes
all over again.