The Pleasure Of The Past Is Washed In The Blood Of Regret

Her parka is a size too large, her scarf is longer than she is tall, and from the looks of it, winter is trying to kill her. I watch her pirouette on two inches of ice behind our apartment, dancing in the dead of winter while snow falls all around her, and I imagine her smile could trick the devil into submission. I am a wave in her ocean, and once I reach her shore, my vapors spread across the sand and linger there as a mist until I am pulled back in again. I’ll choose to remember the way her hand felt in mine, and even if I’ll never know that touch again, I can retrace where her fingers fit between mine, retrace the place where her head fit just below my chin and the look in her eyes after I said something stupid just to hear her laugh again.

Her scuffed sneakers are no longer white, her jean shorts ripped beyond repair, and from the looks of her underneath a summer sun, I’d say I have a reason to believe in God. I’ll choose to remember her chasing blades of grass across the lawn in Holstein Park and my head in her lap while she used the yellow from dandelions to fill in my tattoos. I’ll choose to remember her by the light of the Land with all the other things I left behind.

Cover Art: The French Girl - Pat Kelley