September 3, 2003

  • ticket stub

    we each hold
    half a memory,
    saved like
    little footprints in pavement
    looked back on in amazement.
    but back then were we
    thinking so monumentally
    looking past that friend-to-be
    at things maybe
    meant to be?

    i hold my half,
    while ripped and incomplete,
    whole in that it's concrete
    and thoughts were sweet
    before they were
    vilified and corrupted
    busted and besmirched
    by optimism
    ambition
    imagination at work.
    now i hold my half,
    unsatisfied by
    partitioning,
    fractional potentiality,
    factional actuality,
    war between what just went down
    and the other paths it could've taken.

    you hold your half,
    similarly torn
    by dreams born
    now runaway
    to invade waking days.
    playing
    20 questions with a ticket stub--
    am i wild or pettable,
    analytical or vegetable,
    mineral rock-solid dependable?
    the answers are here
    as they are there
    just ask
    to compare
    and you'll see
    that my half of this memory
    placed with yours
    might tell us something.

    - brother to the night (i just got home), Jerry Ponce