day trips and modanity=poetry

heavy winter

you pick me up around one that afternoon.

it takes us longer to get started than it should

because i know one way to the interstate

and you're more familiar with another.

we take yours.

. . . mine would have been quicker.

we leave the windows of the car cracked

just a crack

to let the smoke from our respective cigarettes sleek out

as if the cockpit to this vehicle were itself on fire.

it's warm in here. you've got the heat on.

you know that i can't breathe well in hot air.

i think back to when i used to stick my head between

the top of the seat where the speakers are and the window in the back

when i was just a baby, really, just to get at colder air...

but, your feet were cold, you explain. we can turn it off soon enough.

meanwhile, the general atmosphere of the car is

that of

heat.

a week or three ago you nagged me about getting my student loan application.

you got it for me first.
i never got the chance to.

i tell you i don't want to talk about it again, and

you explain that "i just wanted to let you know that . . ."

"that YOU were right?"

"yes."

"i would've gone back the next week, you never gave me a chance to!

but . . . thank you."

"that's all i wanted," you say, "was a thank you."

i mention in passing how much like you

i am becoming. how i do things now that

annoyed the fuck out of me that you used to do and say

to me.

"like what?" you ask, a smile on your face.

"like nag."

"nag who?"

"don't worry about it!"

"you'll see, one day. when---IF you have children."

and i silently appreciate the adjustment.

i know it makes you feel more like a mother and me more like a son,

when you get the chance

to correct me and i you. like earlier, in the car when i explained the difference

between ASIAN and ORIENATAL.

we teach each other over the years.

and then

we talk about my sister---your daughter

---and her two children.

you tell me how like her you were at her age,

until you realized that

you weren't getting anywhere that way.

she has to learn in her own time, you surmise.

"she never had a mind for school, like you," you say. "you're two very different people.

i didn't spend as much time with her as i did with you.

my mother raised her. i worked.

and my mother was older, and that was her last grand child.

she was in a different state of mind then, my mother." i thought then,

what an undying treasure it would be to write

the life story of your mother,

and then you,

and then my sister and then

myself.

a trickle down through the ages.

how alike we become to people we swore we would never be like.

and yet, how much more ourselves

we end up in time.

but i don't say that to you.

and i don't know enough about you to pull that off.

so i'll just sit here as we ride down 95 at 75 miles and hour,

25 miles over the speed limit.

i don't wear a seat belt, though. that's how much i trust you.

you bring up dad and how you remember one night he was drunk

and you and i and my sister and her daughter---my neice

---were all in the car and we "flew like the wind on this road," as you say.

i didn't wear my seat belt then either.

that's how much i trust you.

when we finally reach our destination

when we finally find a parking spot,

you tell me, "chy, remember the stores we're near. i came out of this place once

and it took me an HOUR to find the car."

"i will," i say, as i push down the car door button.

you're buying me a p-coat, for my twentieth birthday.

the one you have is old-school army surplus, you got it when you, me and dad

took that trip to new york and we stopped in the village.

i remember that day.

thick and warm with heavy wool.

now they're more for fashion. they're made thinner, with quilted, down-filled linings.

we deliberate on whether to buy one and you say,

"but you need a winter coat for london.

it's cold and damp there. you need a coat, son.

a nice warm heavy winter coat,

so i can know you're safe."

Chy Ryan Spain

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