HOME IS WHERE THE BUGS ARE ! ᵖᵒᵉᵗʳʸ

on watering grass in a drought

sampson street isn't far from me, twenty minutes walking, ten on a bike, five in a car. i've had it mapped out in my head for years, the houses with the wooden planters, stucco not siding, newly paved- not like my block where the streets are plum colored and gravel laden. sampson street was a friend of mine when you lived there, stone lined pathways a confidant. there's been a hole in my life since you left.

we used to muse about these neighborhoods and their rolling lawns, crawling with spiders and ladybugs and landscaped with pools and dreams and italian pavers, all lined up in pretty labor. once i thought you understood me when i talked, but you humored me all those years, didn't you? once i remember us biking to the sev, hands off the bars, weaving through the back roads for cherry slushies. somehow i always knew that had i fallen then, that there would've been a chance that you wouldn't have helped me get up.

i doubt we remember the drought the same way, the grass crunched under my feet but never under yours. the cicadas were strong that year, burrowing under flower beds, awake from a six year sleep.

you could've drowned that summer while the rest of us waited for rain.

when your house went on the market we toured it for folly, raved over the sprinklers, how green was the grass? how perfect was this life and this place? how many worries we could shed on this street?

i don't bike anymore, side affect of fears that have been multiplying for years. besides, it wouldn't quite be the same without you there with me, always dangerously close to cutting me off, sending me off the path and towards the edge. daring me to fall.