chicadee in the airport

i walk out the gate, having landed safely. i call you on my phone and you answer. so reliable. i come down the escalator, sad that the stairs are blocked, and i cannot enter wildly, joyful. we hug and i know this is something that is important. i smile and see the same strange lightness that i feel in your expression, hear it in your voice. we leave the airport and listen to punk rock.

we stand on a mountain in the sky. inland empire, inbound lane. we sit on the warmth of your green car and i feel the steel beneath me, the warmth of you shivering beside me. i know you want to go, but i can see the stars. i can see the stars. i feel hope and firey enthusiasm to be breathing, to be here now. i can see the stars, and then we're in the car, leaving.

we are lying on the couch watching movies. we are wandering in a garden store, searching for plants. i want to leave you a garden to remember me by. to visit when you smoke, when you take the dog out, when you need to feel loved. we are sleeping in, and i am in love with the spare bed because it is twice the size of my bed at home, and it is spare. i am only a guest but i feel as large as life here. at home, i am only one of many, lost in the crowd.

we see a movie, we eat meals. i remember the warm conversations, i remember searching for thrift stores rabidly, as though i needed to buy souvenirs to stay breathing. we eat frozen yogurt at ridiculous hours; i always get fruit, sometimes with cookies. my favorite part is the meals where i make you food. i never realized that i love to cook for others, but only when they don't ask. i give with joyfulness, but only when it's unheeded.

i can't recount everything. memory bleeds and i see gray sweatshirted young men in the airport, traveling in gaggles of testosterone. opposite gender, just as jerseyed, sitting on the floor or in the plane. talking loudly, no sense of self, only a sense of selfish need. i see the bird in the airport for a moment; i want to get a blended coffee drink but i have to repack my luggage. i almost cry and then it is there.

it doesn't sing, doesn't look at anything. just sits on a ledge, sings a note, and flies on.

it was a song, this week. a song that will resonate in my head for months, for years. i have to remember what i said, to myself as i lay awake the nights when i thought, when i remembered, who i am in this place that i call my home. life is what you make of it. and i will make into a song.



what you got? i got my little black dog