20th Century Boy

The night I screamed you out of my life for good, 

I fed your confettied photo to swirling toilet, 

a ticker tape parade and dead fish burial rolled into one.

 

Later I found the box, a jiffy popped trove 

of forgotten snapshots, you bursting in full color 

from every slick surface — sulky, smirky, your mouth

issuing smoke, cigarette blurred in your expressive hands.

 

If I hold them just right,  I can make a flip book of that last day,

bring you back to animated life, the shots where you're walking away

snapping through my fingers, your back retreating in increments.

And if I flip the other way, you coming back.