Lean In

By Gracie Moran

(Don’t tell anyone), but I’m here

with the students on the steps

flickering in buttercream light.

(I think I love them, in their suede coats and their suede-hued hair).

The January sun groans and

we look at one another exhausted

on a tilt, wondering

how to quiet down.

In the silence is heat

and a nod back to the unsteady brick

laid out for the living.

For them! Two girls

whispering, one’s finger wrapped

around the other’s belt loop.

So this is how I’ll remember them forever.

Memory, the miraculous pressure

to touch, taste, and see the past suspended

muffled and moving

like my favorite songs on a steel guitar.

I’m hearing new sounds this year, a score

of parties and commandments to remember

old acquaintances. How they would lean in

and whisper, come here, I have something to share

with you – their voices

arriving the way imaginary waves rage

inside a seashell.

Can I take it back? Tell them we’re here

and we remember. Tell them

all.

Illustration by Selin Ho