Minnows

In my dream I am looking
for my car in some endless
downtown cross street
and I am stumbling
even though I’ve not
drank anything.

Eventually I catch a bus
that exhales loud
with steam when it
pulls up to me,
and I sit down
next to some old guys
in the neon light.

I ask the two how long
they have been friends
and they tell me
between the ages of 5 and 20.
They didn’t consider
themselves friends
anymore but still hung out
from habit or inertia.

I can’t get them to go into
what ended it at first
but they tell me about
a summer stationed in
Japan and all the beaches
they would walk to with the
jagged rocks all scattered
in the tide.

There was a girl who liked to surf
out there and they spoke enough
of each other’s language
that another war ensued
within the larger one.

They never told me who won,
and I woke up in my living room
staring at a painting
on my wall of only minnows,
I hadn’t gotten high
in seven days now.