9. I remember those nights I was immortal with you.

I remember those nights I was immortal with you.

After our football team had lost again,

after the final round of the fight song,

after we had stored our drums in the upstairs closet,

we went outside, and in the parking lot

you would open all the doors on your ’85 Crown Vic,

and turn your speakers all the way up,

and we would dance.

(Mostly, actually, we would sing,

because none of us could dance

and we knew all the lyrics anyway.)

But singing, shouting, poorly dancing,

sweating although we could see our breath,

I felt alive;

and at the end of the night, exhausted,

sitting on the ground in the lamplight,

even if I had tried, I know I could not

have believed we would ever die.

Sunday mornings, I grinned at you from across the congregation.

A frustrated man in his forties, shy,

stuttering, and painfully passionate,

would lead the congregation in song

as three hundred half-sleeping souls

swore they’d fly away.

In the morning,

when I die,

hallelujah by and by.

You and I will fly away.