you can't go back to sleep

that year it was like everyone i knew fell out of a tree, hurt themselves recklessly for show, a display of wringing limbs, self-conscious origami of appendages that seemed suddenly new and necessary, as if we'd just received these parts, just learned that there were unknown things they might do, other uses suddenly possible plausible, i follow you on your bike through the path you choose--twisting dirt alleys and ditch bridges, i sensed the weight of them then--arms and legs held together by the stringy heat of sinews and muscle, straining, straining to hold a course to follow you to the field behind the baseball diamond, the heat there a vacuum and let you insist that this was actually my idea, the way we hide our bikes in a shallow gully, sneaking through trash and weeds, taller, more sure than us, until we come to a spot where the grass is pushed flat by other bodies, other kids come to smoke pot and drink stolen beers we are alone here, and you might motion then that we lay down, maybe me on top of you, our faces not touching, not kissing, not looking at each other, slipping hands underneath clothes, into them placing our mouths on places other than mouths, our movements a mimic of something we can only guess at, until after several minutes, slick, uneasy, you say stop ok, you say, ok. there is a wave passing over us, a wind of smothering, a thick breeze, we dress and shake this off, don't speak, move back to our bicycles, our action figures, our endless streets, sidewalks driveways, and vague ideas--the heats and stirrings, the hint of what we want and wonder if everywhere in that warmth everyone else is waking fumbling in bedrooms and bathtubs, at sleepovers and in tents, backyards, and under blankets, fingers moving moving and moving while the streets spread out, heat hazy and limitless, bodies become slowly aware of themselves, uncalibrated instruments, the wheezes and honks they produce, the uncontrolled bellows, the cacophony a not so secret language--the clamor of singing parts-- of hips, hands and curious palms, shoulders, thighs and suddenly upturned flesh, a chorus of hungry noises that will soon resemble a tune, a summer song we will eventually recognize as our own

-t. cole rachel