The year of everysummer
Alan Butler
I coast down,
air ripping past my lips
arms at my sides.
I always follow a particular path
around the Amp, next to the Athenaeum
off the asphalt and over that stone grate.
It sends me into the clear air
further each time, breaching the skyline
another hundred feet
and I would be in the lake.
This was the first summer
that I fell in love
A crush, shared
that special kind of not-love
teenagers always seem to find.
She was mine, I thought,
for at least a few hours
in the back of the concert
fingers intertwined like writhing snakes.
Then it was over.
It seems like that was every summer,
the one when I was fourteen
that’s where all my memories come from.
I can’t place my most nostalgic moments:
my best friends, my first kiss, seeing the Village People
anywhere else. Even the bad parts:
heartbreak, outrage, a bike thrown into the lake.
I return to that place, physically
and remember those days
with scattered accuracy.
I am tied to it spiritually
and in a way I will always be
gliding along smoothly
hands on the not-handlebars
hearing my heart whistling.
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