Curl

It gets me out,
that metal sound,
I levitate over the sidewalk
for the three blocks
I must cross to make it
over here.

Everyday a smoke cloud
forms around the barrel
of the forty five
I empty in the side
of the old school house
long abandoned
by the district.
We have both been here
many times before.

It’s been a long time
but I remember all
the little things
like waking here
when I would dream
of freezing ponds
inside of me.

I never could
take it out
of my backpack
my hands would stop
and eyes would watch
the clock until
the day became the night
after a bus ride
past my fading town
where towers fall
and crush my skull
repeatedly.

In the broken windows
I see shadows move
as hours pass
I toss my empty cans up
on the roof to build a pile to the moon.
Where the only money
flows from playing the harmonica
in craters with a metal cup the stars fill
when the music wraps around them
like a vine.