Ten

So easily I forgot lifting
The sandbox in Arizona and catching
The geckos and keeping them as pets and
On Halloween candies, jack o'lantern, their tails would fall
Clear from their bodies
And we'd shriek and we'd run
Keep on playing
Playing

My sister
She is with me
Even when we are apart
We were wading through the water
Flashlights flickering in the dark
Climbing the laundry poles
In the tomato garden
Spying on all the neighbors swimming
Laughing
We were laughing

That night
In Maine I met my best friend
Talking 'til 7 A.M
Realizing we're both afraid of the notion
Of having our brains be in the body of a whale
In the ocean, deep
Where the light don't reach
And I loved him instantly
I knew we could keep talking
Talking

On that drive
Up the winding mountain roads
From Hudson to Vermont in the seasons
Where snow, the boys asleep in the back of the car
We were in the front, we were singing along
To every word of the songs
That helped make us who we are
At the top of our lungs
Singing
Singing

My mother
My mother, she keeps a journal
Of her childhood memories as they return
My favorite's the story recounting when she saw an eagle
With a fish in it's mouth
She was ten when she wrote it down
There's a sweetness in us that lives long past the dust
On our eyes, once our eyes finally close