I’m from imaginary bomb shelters

and “ignorance is bliss,” from my sister finding ways to escape, first with me and then without.

From speaking the wrong language,

and falling on deaf ears.

I’m from my best friend’s disappearance

and his subsequent mental breakdown upon his return.

I’m from his trust issues and mine,

secondhand terror of the smothering Jewish mother stereotype manipulating me with bagels and lox.

I’m from fear panic figure eights in the ice

outstretched hands to help from a fall and a body formed into endless desire to protect, from a failure to do so.

I’m from bowling alleys alley ways between

the coffeeshops where you cried over your lost virginity and told me you thought you were losing your sanity.

I’m from the back of Jared Esposito’s 1970 Ford Bronco

with its missing roof and the wild zephyr bursting in warm symphonies through my cherry-hair and around your blue raspberry sunglasses

I’m from the lows

so wildly low and the highs so wildly high, every beep on the machine like a gunshot in my mind

I’m from skeletons

in the closet under my skin beneath my bed waiting to pull me under - so pull me down if you want to, and I hope that you want to, ‘cause I want to be yours now and I want to say it loud - and skeletons beneath the skin of my father’s smiling face when he claps for my sister’s success.

I’m from the hospital bed under buzzing lights

throwing up red tired eyes winter nights forget your victory we are never free from the chains we found to bind us, from the ghosts inside your mind you keep like favored friends O missing summer days, longing summer nights O singer crooning crouching inside my crackling radio O escape to the frozen river to gather the wilting rue and poppy, and make me a crown of   a deciduous yet semi-perennial nature to wear to your funeral.

I’m from her eyes and your hands

and his lips and the roads running back to the sea letting you drown, for just another taste of letting him pull me down.