When We First Met

You came up to me
I didn’t know you from Adam,
“Park your bicycle in my living room,” you said,
So we moved in together
At 201 N. Secnod Street, Leesville, Louisiana,
The street sign reflecting the malaprope
In the southern military town,
I used to walk from our three room duplex
Over one block to where the tracks were,
To watch the Kansas City Southern
Creep slowly north,
Wishing I could jump on and ride back home,
But you were there and where would that leave us?
I found out soon enough
When you called me out on the porch
Pointing to the box you had hidden underneath
That contained books of trigonometry and calculus,
You drew triangles and squares in the air
Explaining to me how I now had to leave,
I walked off with you still talking,
Between the house and the honeysuckle
You appropriated my soul,
Calling it yours in the cadence of some cabal
You were reading from the mystical books
That now covered the wicker settee
Where once we had loved each other,
Circling the yard I came upon you
With a book on your head creating a triangle hat
While you read another
That you held resting on your feet
The two forming a perfect square
With you inside as you recited:
“Peter, Peter pumpkin eater
Had a wife and couldn’t keep her.”
Over, and over, and over.