When the Weasel Popped

We all played our childhood games,

Hopscotch and jump-rope,

Singing nursery rhymes and chanting together

One-two-three-four-five-six-pick up sticks

My hair is still wet from the shower

Clinging like seaweed to my neck

Droplets fleeing from the weak and saddened

Strands.

We played hide-and-seek,

Cops and Robbers, fleeing in organized chaos.

The cops would always win,

But everyone wanted to be the robber.

I peeked into your suitcase

While you were in the bathroom

Collecting your things.

You could be going on a vacation

For all I can see.

Your cotton shirts and grey slacks are pressed

And folded

Fortified by carefully rolled Argyle socks.

I can tell you were always the Cop.

But I was a strange child

I didn't like Ring-around-the-Rosy

Until I heard

That it was about the plague.

I thought the monkey was mean

And I always wanted to know what happened

To the weasel

After the inevitable

Absolute be-all-end-all of

Pop!

I didn't want to watch,

So I went to the window instead,

Looking out at your blurred taxi

Waiting in the rain rain go away.

You just had to leave in a steady downfall

Because that's the way it's supposed to happen

And you never understood that I hated clichés.

I guess it's my fault, really.

I tried to skip from two to ten

And you were afraid of eight.

The concluding click of lock and door

Doesn't have the same joyous finality

Of monkey and weasel.

My ashes and mulberry life darts around me.

So I lean my heated forehead against the

Streaked and frosty glass

And mouth your name

Until my breath forms a cloud

Of grey and wannabe smoke.

We won't fall down

We won't fall down

You're too steady and solid

To teeter totter anyway.