Marissa Nicosia

He asks me if I've been behaving myself
and I have to laugh because I picture him, 15, shaggy haired, half drunk,
carrying a rake, swinging on a tire swing
or a vine. You learned to ride a bike without training wheels long before I did
and I was there for your first kiss. —
I was an excuse.—
I wanted to melt into the couch and disappear.
Have you been behaving yourself and how did they catch you?

I snuck down to you, one afternoon, drunk by your suggestion, we ate pizza bagels, you hated that boy I kissed and turned out to be right.

You kissed every girl in the class and got away with it,
when your hair was still sandy.
Before the cigarettes and the dark at the side of the carnival.
After the tire swing, the paste, the button down shirts.