At fifteen you showed me how to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge as though you grew up knowing how to trapeze your body across the sky; each time we found ourselves in a crowd of angry, fearing skinheads looking to beat down anyone who didn’t look like them we found ourselves asking questions and calling out hate; you were the calm voice of reason to my aggressive “punch first, ask questions later” attitude; you, clad in your omnipresent Overkill teeshirt and red flannel smiling and saying c’mon don’t be mad there’s pizza saying c’mon the lights are dancing and we can waltz through it this pain this mercurial time of being a teenager on the edge of sorrow dipping our toes in and saying look how the rain does shine look it’s 1992 and all my friends are dead look I know you’re folding laundry & watching Kurt Loder on MTV but I just tried this new drug and discovered the meaning of life it’s all one, it’s the only truth and we sat on those astroturf fruit stands on 5th Avenue as it poured and poured and I watched as you became translucent in your quest to meet the center of everything
Melissa Eleftherion (she/they) is a cis queer human, a writer, a librarian, and a visual artist. Born & raised in Brooklyn, she holds degrees from Brooklyn College, Mills College, and San Jose State University. They are the author of the full-length poetry collection, field guide to autobiography (The Operating System, 2018), & eleven chapbooks from various presses including trauma suture (above/ground press, 2020), & sunflower spell (poems-for-all, 2022). Her work has been widely published & featured in venues like Quarter after Eight, Sixth Finch, Entropy, & KRCB FM Radio. Melissa now lives in Northern California where she manages the Ukiah Branch Library, curates the LOBA Reading Series, and serves as the Poet Laureate of Ukiah
Leave a Reply