Ode to Monroe / Ode to Home

I’m made of three shelves of coffee mugs—four in December

Full of kindergarten teacher slip sayings, 

a bouquet of Whoopsie Daisies, 

a bowl of Holy Guacamole, 

Candles in kitchen, candles in the foyer, 

candies in a dish and neighbors who dip their hands right in

Grand Central Station front door, revolving little league colleagues

and a doorbell we didn’t realize was broken for months, because no one uses it anyway

The fedex guy and my five year old neighbor both call my father by his first name.

I’m a painting soaked in Sunday night piano lessons and back-deck dinners 

Barefoot with the kids next door, running across driveway, grass, driveway

A best friend since girl scouts,

A tree house with Taylor swift lyrics written on the walls in sharpie

And the mortification of learning boys were using it for their airsoft gun hideout

The worst part of the bike ride was the straight shot up the hill

But you could see the high school through the woods on the reckless brakeless rush back down into the cul-de-sac, and in August, you could hear the band practice.

The way you stumbled down the hill at the Friday night football games

Trying not to fall on your ass, or blush as you pass the boy you tutored in math

The places we first kissed and squealed

Parking lots and libraries and fire pits and basements of air mattresses holding

Charming secrets, the kind that feel like you’re inside of a book

The kind that sound like burnt CDs and the most romantic moments behind a five guys burgers and fries.

We were carnival ride kids with strawberry festival smiles, lemonade stand legs

Gossip that spread like wildfire, or mono, or those terrible twitter hashtags

We were jump rope for heart kids, art kids in the I hallway

Lockers slamming and boys slamming into each other into lockers

Into bathrooms of tears and whispers and the excitement before a big moment

Because every moment was so big until suddenly it wasn’t.

There’s this feeling you get when you’re driving back into Monroe;

You pass these boulders with graffiti staining some classes’ names into legacy

There’s a slice where everyone slows because they know where the cops lie in wait

And it’s not lost on you that it’s called The Connector,

That little strip between here and the rest of the world

That little exhale, to know that at least from here, you know your way back home.