"a year of christmas lights"

"a year of christmas lights"

written with teenage daydreams playing by jake kilroy.

in that year of christmas lights,

back when i had fevers,

my heart swelled

for any girl

that would

quote dylan.

but that was only until

i learned parrots don’t make love

and realized even i botch my favorite lines.

sex is universal, but it ain’t everything,

i was told by an english teacher

who didn’t care enough,

back when i didn’t know better.

disappear into feathered skin all you want,

but you won’t find enlightenment in motion alone.

truth carried by fingers,

truth woven by tongues,

truth built by anarchists

posing as merchants

posing as priests;

it all means you get yours eventually.

nights last longer than clocks given them credit,

no matter how much you bless a bed with holy water

you sweat when your own heart makes you dizzy.

so the years came

and i welcomed them.

they became a part of me,

sinking into teenage skin

and curdling the fibers;

a recipe spoiled by

its very ingredients,

served hot for every meal

until the last one is poison.

yet in that summer of unexplainable heartache,

i remember black and gold

sparkling throughout the city

like jewels thrown from getaway cars,

sticking to the velvet that pops purpose.

but it was a darling poet's bedroom in old town,

with every color of a melting rainbow aglow,

tacked to the wall, snaking through the bookshelf

that was home away from home,

somewhere i could fall asleep in daydreams,

even when i couldn’t stand

what we talked about in the kitchen

as unpaid philosophers against blue and white country print,

each of us killing time before the world became a stage.

here we were in rehearsal for the roles we were born to play,

finding it impossible to remember our lines

while pointing out the cues of other performers.

later, in what rolled like a century,

i discovered women passed on me

because i couldn’t quote plath

and the best i could do was spark didion

but that wasn’t exactly it.

and that was the trouble.

nothing was close enough.

nothing was good enough.

nothing was “it" enough

nothing was.

and that’s all we want now,

the beautiful freedom to lose.