What does it mean to be seen?
Two eyes to look up
see shadows
Places familiar, faces temporary
The only consistent
A pair
Au pair
Of parents
I belonged in your arms when we lived on Greenfield in the D.
I clung to a picture of you, all I ever knew
In 6th grade I was good at flag football, I remember my male teacher telling me, ‘you’re one of the best girl players I’ve ever seen’
Preteen
Pretend
Blend and bend to belong
You were my Romeo and I your Juliet
our parents worked so hard to keep us apart –
we laid in the ditch at the corner of Jefferson and Taylor hiding from your Moms car
You knew the shape, headlights of her Monte Carlo in the dark
Seen
Teen
Between
The cramps, the trodden grass, the crickets, and my hair perfumed by chlorine eyes clouded by Visine
visions visited, picture a crystal blue Italian stream
I belonged to a clique in 1988, four gals who formed a bond
we drew and painted our way into a symbiotic dance
of a future that never materialized
The teams, the chants
the chance to dream
The uniformity and the urgency to schedule our time
sometimes I just wanted to relax
I always belonged as a this or a that —
Daughter, Granddaughter, Sister, Mother, Nana, Friend, Wife
Life
a moving target; a heart flips and flops like a fish escaping the dock
Be still
be quiet
Be
Long to desire
Stories strung together like cotton sheets all sharing the same clothes wire