
Something pink about the way playmate turns to lover turns to pilot turns to
Drifter in sky
Turns to animal in sky
But to my vindication you were never that obscene to me
You come back to places that spit you back out and still manage to fly
Faster than the industrious men who flick their mustache hairs
Deaf to the cries that twist them more into buccaneer than honor-weathered men
Pirates, overjoyed to gamble a pigs life (and lose)
I sing to them – a facade, unlike how I sang to you
My voice skims the Adriatic and its waves crash a true blue
There’s something red about the way she follows in your footsteps
And you come out of it bruised, blood-stained and redder still
Moments choke, fair-weather heroes fall
All of a sudden I’m clogged up with memory
It tastes of brine and Adriatic sweat, and latent romance
Those days your boyhood was green and wild and still staunch like steel
You took me out to sea and you took me to the air
Looking down at the waves, churning tide
Before your reflection shouted swine
Long before you were a creature of war
Years before you would trace the outline of your compatriots in breathless clouds
You were a boy in the way I was a girl
Something blue about the way you come back to the sea and sky
And my garden, everlasting
There’s something red to be said about fly-by goodbyes
Julia is a writer and comfort-enthusiast from Pennsylvania. She is often curled up with her goofy cat Larry and rewatching movies.