Wilt

by kate devine

There is a fern perched on the windowsill in a white pot
beside a bowl of pennies and it looks as calm as I’d like to feel next to an ATM.

*

All of my idealistic young friends have either grown boring or sold out.
There were songs we used to play while driving to Vermont
We used to say, “I never want to not be here.”

The June that we were seventeen, Ali confessed to me
“Adam gave me money for plan B, I don’t need it.”
She treated us to pancakes the morning after instead.
Meg, Ali and I laughed and swore never to do this again.

Meg does not feel that she deserves her BFA.
“Bachelor of NOTHING, BA in BOYS IN MY BED.
My mom works her ass off so I can be wasted in this cab.”

Is this moment romance? Candle lit, with debt mounting guilt?
It was easier when we just dated whoever worked at Gee-Gee’s Pizza.

*

I ran the red light in front of
Asbury Park High School and the policeman
didn’t really mind. Driving and writing a poem on
my iPhone beside New Jersey Transit’s North Jersey coast line.
That was today.

Today was lucky, catatonic, surrounded by
carefully selected props and noises to embellish
the feeling I am reaching for and missing.