I thought we were going to kiss. I thought we were I thought we were.

weren’t the signs—I mean—weren’t the signs there? Like notes—on a music sheet—I can’t read music, but I can get by, I can sing, so—they just have to be there and—I can get by I can sing I can get by.

you were on the pullout couch in the den wearing grey sweatpants and your dark shirt—like a cloud felled by the City smog—I know you don’t like the City don’t like it at all—

but you said you liked coming here and well—you said you liked coming here to me—and you were lying there and I thought—

—tell him—tell him—tell him—tell him—tell him—

because he could die in the bus tomorrow—and you could die on the train and and and
you will never clutch the scent of wet lips on this boy—

who’s only waiting on the pullout couch. If you don’t move—speak to him move speak to him—the asphalt and the cement and the lights in Times Square—none of them will sing for you like some birds he hatched or lemons he suckled in a place that lemons don’t
go.

my thoughts set off with you on the bus to Boston the next morning. I woke up early for you thinking of all the maybes, but breath is too hot at that time, so no, sorry, next thing.
no kissing.

no signs.

no song from the notes in the symphonies of little music—

# # #

Jack Becker is a New York City native currently studying Creative Writing at Columbia University, and during the school year he attends St. Paul’s School, a boarding school in Concord, New Hampshire.

Photo credit: Terri Malone