The Summer We Played Pretend

Ice cream makes me think of Bluey
how lessons are only as valuable as holding
ourselves tightly and clenching our teeth against the chatter
of being blue raspberry brain freezes.

It was the only way to stay cold in the summer—
when our skin was so hot we exposed all of it.

We remained red, but not from the sun kissing—
it wasn’t the sun doing the kissing—
and our breath would remain invisible, inside us.

Pretend you are a mermaid and that I—
I am a man drowning in your ocean with your lips
pressed tight against mine. Hermetic.

It was not the weight of pretend holding us down—
your nakedness pressing comfortably into mine as we sank
into the depths of adulthood and slipped

into autumn.

JKolasch

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