Circle Up

'welcome to our house'
they even opened their car
to the teens’ delight

if they could see them
maybe they could listen; help them
maybe they’d be safe

this is how it starts:
with a circle and some words
and a little hope

Petal by Petal

surrounded by blooms
(yet the reality kills)
as they slowly die

you can feel the heat
creeping into the photo
burning from within

eighteen long months late,
we celebrate our friendship
of thirty short years

she survived COVID
now, we're both vaccinated
to celebrate love

what a perfect place
green grounds, infinity pool
for endless friendship

thank you for the “no.”
as phallic as this lupine
(allium ignored)

i will learn from this
(things i tell myself at night)
and grow a sagebrush

it will bloom purple
(you can’t see my true color)
and you can’t taste it

yet, here it blossoms
as beautiful as the home 
you constantly loathe

i know. i know. i…
you don’t see what i see. stop.
but god. how it hurts.

eighteen years finished 
with this mask that hides us all 
from society

my perfect symbol: 
trying so hard for peaches
even while dying

we'll never escape
the "boot straps" mentality
or fix these numbers

from prom to vaccine
in a short eight-hour night
(let science save us)

there's no heartbreak here
just my girl, eighteen years old,
ready to face them

sneakers underneath
(pandemic proms are outdoors,
under tents, in grass)

she's taller, braver.
in her silver floor-length gown,
she masters the night

and aren't we a crowd?
this master-mix of humans,
standing on these rocks?

unsinkable us
right below the Molly Brown
(ready to swim. Win.)