lifetime

about my favorite dive bar

my mom asks why i keep going back

to that place

.

she says

you become the people you hang around

.

and maybe i do

.

but i think i’m okay with that

---

there’s something about it

.

the door that always sticks

the bud light clock glowing

like a low, faithful moon

.

the smell of fryer oil and luck

.

it’s not heaven

.

but it’s the only church i’ve found

that doesn’t ask me to lie

---

sandra’s there most days

.

green eyeshadow

silver hoops

paula abdul hips

and a heart that won’t quit dancing

.

she says lifetime

mid-thought

.

like it’s her way of saying

we never know, honey

.

rumors hang off her like fringe

but she claps the hardest

when someone sings badly

.

we just have so much talent here

.

she reminds me

joy can be a kind of rebellion

.

that sometimes

even pain wears sequins

---

jeff’s there too

.

smile like light through smoke

.

every night he says

“my brother bought my favorite hangout”

.

like pride alone

could keep the lights on

.

he drinks too much

wears the same size jeans he did at twenty

.

he reminds me of my dad

.

a working man

steady even when the day’s been cruel

.

calls himself a butthead

when what he really means

is lonely

---

justin sits near the back

.

robbed banks once in florida

eight years behind a locked horizon

.

now he can’t stop talking

about his son’s home runs

.

he tells stories about his mammaw

.

says

women hold the sky up, son

.

not knowing that’s feminism

.

just knowing it’s true

---

and jimmy

.

dr. pepper in hand

vietnam in his bones

.

he lost his wife last year

and couldn’t bear the silence

.

so he comes for the hum

.

writes poems sometimes

scribbles a name

loses the rest

.

he reminds me

what grief sounds like

.

when it’s learning

how to sing again

---

sometimes i wonder

if i love them too much

.

if i’m collecting them like stories

instead of sitting among them

.

but i don’t think they’d mind being seen i think they’d say

hell, pour another

.

and laugh

until the ache quiets down

---

if i become the people i hang around

.

then i become

.

sandra’s defiance

jeff’s tired kindness

justin’s second chance

jimmy’s stubborn hope

.

and maybe that’s enough

.

to carry them home in me

.

to raise a glass

and say lifetime

.

because we never know

and the jukebox is still singing

---

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venmo