nobody belonged there and neither did you

remember when we were a little more
stupid and a little more thin, when we fought over
who would be the least likely to
work in a cubicle and who would
marry last and who hated the most
people in the realest way and
 who would die first due
to the poorest lifestyle choice?

everyone wanted the title of Craziest Aunt.
we all settled for I Hate Kids, I'd Never Have Them
Anyway, They Just Poop and Sleep, Don't People Know
We Have an Overpopulation Problem. we had malthus fever.

we stripped headphones, shirts, pants in public parks
 and read our classic novels on benches, always with
 the title visible to passerby--
gum bubble nabokov cut-denimed summer,
men looked at my naked legs and i looked at the
page without reading it.

we laughed about it later like, What a creeper.
nine someones said that summer, I guess you could
say I'm old for my age, blew smoke rings in parents'
backyards, we were ancient, we were fossils. we imagined
 ourselves ruins of fallen shopping malls, It's weird, right, people
think I'm in college but I'm only seventeen--
we broke into swimming pools and someone always
 slept next to the toilet when we drank.

feel nostalgia for a chain coffeeshop, summer
specialty iced mochas they sell in every town.
 none of this ever belonged to you in the first place.