after The Doors
We’re perched in the top branches of a tree.
Cauliflower clouds hang in a blue sky
the color of the first day of summer vacation.
We could be in a child’s drawing. Perhaps,
I was that child; perhaps, you were.
Our legs and arms coil like serpents around the limbs.
A portable radio nailed to a branch blares,
"The West is the best. The West is the best.”
It is a darkness like soil, a cool cavern, a time
without a timekeeper, but it is also a fire, a rage, an invitation.
It's summer now, your season.
Your glance sails to the west. The blue of your eyes
marries the air and there is a shine,
sunlight alighting on chrome.
“The Forever Ocean,” you nod,
and I can tell a part of you is swimming there, even now.
A seagull suspends overhead, hangs like an origami ornament.
And, in that moment, a sky-door opens.
“Sidle through, start at the beginning,
but you could lose something,” you caution.
You swab your forehead with a white handkerchief
and continue drinking the ocean with your eyes,
and I know I’m on my own.
It’s a comfort and a curse.