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I Flew Out to California
I flew out to California
And had to get an uber to O’Hare
When the train stopped
One way I know I still love you-
You sent me money when I was
Being meanest to you
I called you on my cell in California
And said I don’t know how to feel,
Rolled in a white sheet,
In a beach-town house with low ceilings,
Over the phone you said I know,
I guess right now how could you
In the morning I threw roses into the Pacific
With a loser’s might, for my aunt
And held the arms of her drunk friends
Walking up the beach
Her scarf collection hanging over our necks,
Rippling in the wind like flags
The ones for surrendering
You told me at Thanksgiving
You could see it in her eyes
And I am thinking now,
In the Pacifica sunlight,
I still don’t understand love
And why there is no poignant moment
At her memorial, or on the phone with you
Why instead
I am streaking across the months
In uneven, muddled bursts
Not sure how to rest my hand on anything
The wheel of the rental jumpy under my fingers
Winding on highway one
With just the lives of my family at stake
And there are beautiful things,
For so far around me,
But only a rattle where a gasp should be
And only confusion where love should be,
Because something weird and wicked
Tells me I should do this alone,
Or maybe it is just the observation
That sometimes people don’t make it better
People don’t make it better
But I call you back in Chicago,
And I don’t learn anything new about love,
But I call you back in Chicago
To tell you