We Stopped for Daily's

We stopped for snacks at the Daily’s on the way back

The lucid, translucent orange and blues hit the windshield

So perfectly.

Not bound by brick and mortar

Untaxed by the worries

Of becoming a starving artist.

We listen to Sublime on the way home

(Just like we do every Friday)

Your brother turns up the volume so loud

I can’t hear my own voice.

I drown in the music

The bass hitting with each heart beat

Still, I listen closely.

I drink pineapple soda and sit in the backseat

I think to myself; I want friends like you

Have.

The kind that stops for snacks and firewood at Daily’s

The ones that know what the other is saying without

Saying a word.

We’ve known each other for seven months,

But when you invite me to the conversation

I still look at you with golden eyes.

Before you I spent so long feeling the heaviness

Of a burden too large to bury. 

I look out these windows and see into my past,

Graveyards of past best friends

Abandoned

And in mourning.

When we pull into the driveway, 

Opaque stars have awakened, their light

Travels across our eyes

Your brother takes a swig of pineapple soda.

My pineapple soda.

I don’t take this as an insult, 

but rather a compliment

He knew he could take mine

And suddenly I feel as if I, too am a brother.