Park Benches and Polaroids

cross country practice

Running is my lifeline.

Sometimes it was my only way

to think, feel, or be 

purely iron;

invincible and stronger than

anything in the world.

My hair had been

chopped short,

a bob of a ponytail

streaming behind me

like a ribbon of gold.

I was never without film scores while I ran/

Shore, Powell, Kamen, Williams, Bohn, Desplat

with their genius of music in my ears

just loud enough

to not drown out

the sound of my feet

pat pat pat-ing

on the gray gravel,

hot

sticky

summer heat

swirling around.

There's a cadence

in my soundtrack

that's going to take me

over this hill and

past the school

to the fence with the giant American flag,

the only feasible landmark

for miles around.

There's a boy running next to me

(thinks he's gonna beat me)

(he's pretty good, maybe he will).

A skinny kid with

fogged up glasses.

Yesterday we had a sword fight with relay sticks,

so we've become pretty good friends.

After several days

of sharing this summer heat

just before the beginning of school

where races will begin

and slacking off on the field

will end,

we decided to be inseparable

on the track.

I'm laughing out loud,

and so is he,

bursts of excitement under ragged breath

because he doesn't know that the main melody line

just came on

so i'll be the one

dashing over to the fence —

pat pat patpatpatpatpatpat

and winning

our unspoken race.