"Ephebic Cries"

 Then existed a boy, threaded together by a dead mother's love, and empty door frames. The fearlessness was a shield, Imaginary. Then a boy existed, who wore baggy jeans and a heaping amount of Citré Shine Hair Gel over his frosted tips. Then he was 18 years old, he talked back, violated speed limits, and ran laps alone, down the block, late after sundown. He lived in a home of Instability, but he peeled his socks off in bed, his room rooted in heat, hungover he slept in. He was fevered and knotted with fresh business by the hours. Now? I’m 48 years old and I’m not married. I don’t run anymore, not with my back too sore and my ankles swollen. My stability? I’m glued down strong. Now, it is a lonely place. Now, I wring my hands at an office cubicle, with razor nicks eating my neck. But when I doze off, I witness the hot hands around his back, kissing her lips of a blurred complexion. The crowd and the thumping of a Stereo, it was a fog so dampened by ephebic life. My memory serves me visions. A relationship gone too soon. It was a girl, so penetrating, piercing, He drank her shadow, his fingers combing her hair and around her hands around my back as we mouthed each other’s sultry fantasies. Glitter pasted to the sticky floors. Our skin is still pink with infancy. I don’t remember her name, don’t know if she had one. Could it have been the tickles of a changing body? The persuasion from a passion fruit wine too old for his own good. Drink the kool-aid and be free. Close the door and keep it locked. We’ll be one forever until we’re thousands of pieces apart. We can trust each other until we can’t. I don’t trust anymore, but I pay my prices. I keep the TV on at all hours to conceal the silence, not the silence, the absence of noise. That commotion I used to know, those conversations I once eavesdropped. High school was complete with the girl that dipped her head out a car window, professed secrets onto hallway walls, and hollowed her eyes with dark liner. Now, romances come and go. Commitment, I cannot afford. Even when I did, I never bought it. He Imagined he felt nothing when he saw her run around with other boys. How he pretended violence was boring, like he knew real conflict. Now, my eyes go dry at murder. Real news does not approach enough to even nauseate me. If his feet were too slow, He’d drive a little faster. He’d master the danger. He was not afraid. Now, there’s no thrill that fondles risk. There’s no playful in rationality. He figured his soul was so charred, if he peeled back the dead remains, they would reveal a version of himself too precious to expose to the infective world around him. His gullibility is so adorable. His despondency was so sweet, but so beaten, it grew black. Now, there’s no exploitation I have to fear. Now exists a man, a spiritless number so bleak and obsolete. Momentarily then and again, I’ll open a drawer. I find journal entries, report cards, and yellowing polaroid's. Now exists a false freedom. Then existed a boy, sobbing burgeoning tears, but every moment, he bled liberation.