“you’re every car that passes by/everybody in the corner of my eye” (off my mind, joe p) // i remember the good times and the bad ones, too

the afternoons were always

blue-green. the mornings were

always a young, summer type of yellow. the

evenings, they were

always

orange-black-yellow.

the orange of the setting sun,

the black of the coming dark night,

and the yellow of the lamplight

and your bedsheets.

i still remember the sounds of the birds

and the way the carpet smelled before

you had it torn up and replaced

with that white, fake-wood stuff.

i still remember you

singing to tom jones,

the grease on the table,

the way you made me mac and cheese,

the way you made me ramen

that i still can’t get perfect

and it bugs me that i miss the way you made it.

i still remember us looking through boxes of movies

and finding the best ones

and watching them while my uncle was at work.

i still remember our walks

and helping you water the plants

and helping you pick the oranges that were really mandarins

(i still remember you correcting me).

i still remember dog sitting with you,

and you sneaking me yorks,

and showing me around the bathroom of the neighbor’s house.

i still remember that halloween

that i dressed up at your house

and we went to the neighbor’s party.

i remember us going to the post office

and checking out the bookcase

of free books together,

and going back to your house

(back home back home back home)

to read them together.

i still remember all the good times

and the bad ones, too.

i still remember the summer i lost you

and the letters i wrote to you

in green and blue pens.

i still remember holding onto the movies we’d bought before

the summer i lost you,

holding on to them and hoping it was enough

that you might want me back.

i still remember all the days and nights and mornings i cried

that summer i lost you.

i still remember the three weeks before my birthday,

just after the summer i lost you,

and how you’d said you wanted to see me.

i still remember needing to take a breather

the night before the fall you lost me,

and a week before my birthday.

i still remember looking up at that midnight black september night,

and hearing the frogs in the canyon croak

and the mountain lions roar,

and sitting in the bed of my uncle’s pickup,

crying alone in the almost-cold warmth.

i still remember how you found me, and hugged me, and cried,

and said that i’d come back and it’d all be better.

i still remember that i came back,

two years later,

and it wasn’t all better.

i still remember the good times,

and the bad ones,

too.

and i still remember all of the plans

written in my poems

and i still cry

because they can’t work

while i still love you. and even if i thought

i’d ever stopped, i never did,

and i don’t know

how i will. because i still remember

all of the bad times, but the good ones, too.