-thank you, bayside-

Maybe I want both
And I can have them here.

I can come out of the Showbox at the Market
having just seen Bayside with Aaron and Luke and Anna and Fo
and holding Chris’s drumstick he threw
into the crowd after the set
and i can pose with Jack O’shea for a photo op under the marquee
and then I see Anthony Raneri
on the corner about to cross the street into Pike Place and I run up
and I know he has social anxiety so I just tell him thank you
probably for saving my life more times
than he knows.

And then we follow the same way talking about the show
and me waving my new drumstick and we drunk and made drunker by the lights
of the city and what time is it and who cares?
And we go down the stairs to Western Avenue and turn right still talking and cracking jokes
but no one ever talks about how this won’t last forever

And then we climb the hill back up Western to Native Park
and there is the Sound stretching out unseen
before us. We can’t see it, but we know it’s there
maybe like God
we can smell it in the air and it’s there
in our memories
faint but glowing like the green light from the ferries
floating forward and backward
now in the distance like something remembered
long ago,
far away but still giving off
light.

-seattle wa-