{On my 24th birthday, I am grilling vegetables by myself}

On 14 July 2023 By Reid CarpenterIn PoemsLeave a comment

I am beginning the 25th year of my life and
if I’m being honest
it is not all I thought it would be
the so-called freedom of age tempered by responsibility
by the knowing that I have choices to make

the people tell me that this is what your midtwenties are like
and I believe the people
I believe in the common experience

I am always one to believe in the common experience
believe in my ordinariness
believe in the basic facts of my life being familiar to many others
and it is not often that it does not comfort me
I have no need to feel special
but lately I have been resistant to comfort
I have felt singular and removed in my confusion and disappointment
alone in my feeling of being aimless and lost

on my 24th birthday, I am grilling vegetables by myself
sweating while I flip zucchini and squash and big pieces of broccoli
burning tempeh to the grates
an audio creation about mary oliver playing in my ears
thinking of my friends who will eat this food

I am wondering about returning to myself
thinking that
whether or not I am familiar to anyone else
I have not left her behind
I have not left myself

{Shoutout to the Chicago beach sand in my purse}

On 21 June 2023 By Reid CarpenterIn Poems2 Comments

Now:
There was a time when I would have tried to save it,
put in a damn jar or something, not labeled or anything sensible like that,
to remember the feeling of us sitting on a blanket in the wind,
eating trader joes snacks, and laughing over the theoretical gossip of our lives.

As I’ve been trying to do, I began to dream while I swam my laps and
I imagined us all living together, in an old house or on the same piece of land.
I imagined what we might grow and then, because I need more practice,
I stopped imagining and started reminiscing.

A few weeks back:
On our walk to the beach, I amble a few steps behind,
stray words from the conversation ahead coming back to me,
C– or K– occasionally glancing behind to check I’m still with.
I relish the feeling of following and not being lost all the same.

C– tells me they want to be a buff, tattooed queer,
androgynous and elegant,
and I tell them, “All I want is to be strong.”

At the Ethiopian place, all of us, 6 then 5
— the years of knowing one another gaping long between us
in a way I had previously reserved for people much older than us —
eat eagerly but without losing focus on which of us is telling their story.

K– apologizes for the smallest of transgressions from years ago,
laughing about the way it has stuck with her
and I say, “I forgive you, I forgive you, of course,”
before she’s even finished the story.

We talk of who is missing from our slow late night conversations,
calling in the spirits of R– and E–, T–, H–, and M– (you know who you are),
thinking of what they might say here and now,
what we’d be doing if they were gathered, too.

Now:
I haven’t yet regretted pouring the sand from my purse onto the pavement
of the YMCA parking lot which, if I’m being honest, indicates a lot growth
and maybe says something about my growing capacity to stare forward
into the future and dare to piece together a life I love,
but I’d like to leave the dreaming up to you (you know who you are) all the same.

Tell me where to be.
I’ll be there.

{26 January 2023}

On 21 June 2023 By Reid CarpenterIn PoemsLeave a comment

I used to write with a feverish need. The difference between
penned word + thought negligible, my notebooks
were covered in random phrases, things I wouldn’t remember
even days later when I read back.
I was my own audience, rereading over + over my own thoughts.
My journal was open to you, + you + you, though.
Free to browse the pages, leave your own thoughts, + I was never
worried what you might think + maybe we were all sad,
sadder than we thought.
Now, when I write, I worry what someone might think, if
they were allowed to browse.
I worry about my metaphors; I’ve lost confidence in my own voice,
trusting that it is mine + it is enough.
Recently, I’ve been living with pain + biting my nails like I did then.
But I want to be in touch – with who I was +
also with the thoughts + the feelings,
regardless of their audience.

{29 December 2022}

On 21 June 2023 By Reid CarpenterIn Poems2 Comments

On my way from one home to another,
I drive through snow and gray for miles and miles.
I stop to rinse my windshield every hour or so,
thinking of the years my dad drove
a car without working wipers and how he
assured me this morning that I would be fine.

My defrost is on full blast and it is
almost comical that I am sweating
in my tank top while the snow falls.
Once, when only one hand is white knuckling the wheel,
I press my forearm to cold glass and I gasp.
Nostalgia grips me but I’m not entirely sure
where it has come from: tears rise to my eyes.

Sometimes, when I’m traveling, I remember
the faint whisper of a zipper closing a bag.
I am three, four, maybe five and my dad
is leaving our home for a week, for a night, I don’t know.
My mind has manufactured the next step of his travel:
dark roads canopied by trees, one set of headlights.

Some days when this memory visits me,
I am in the car with him: sitting in the back, sleepy.
Some days, I am feeling left behind.

After a few too many scares,
the hours of the trip lengthened
by weather and traffic,
I arrive home,
shoulders tense and eyes tired.
I drag myself inside,
leaving in the trunk of the car,
with my luggage, the paralyzing desire
to be a child again.

To be sleepy in the backseat,
to be given directions,
to forget about the broken things
once the drive is over.

{23 March 2022}

On 21 June 2023 By Reid CarpenterIn PoemsLeave a comment

Posting after a long break, as I am wont to do. Posting today, especially for Marianne, and anyone else who continues to read my work and, by extension, love me with simple dedication. Thank you. ❤

A friend I’m just beginning to know is
walking past me with knee-high black
heeled cowboy boots and no raincoat,
a cardigan fluttering around her.
She makes them look sensible for the weather
and the image in my head is of how it might be
to one day call her,
with bad news or heartbreak,
on a rainy spring day.
I imagine myself curled on a couch,
watching my door open, watching her
pull off the boots, shake off the cardigan,
fold into the cushions next to me,
the cat appearing to be pet by
my friend who is wordless and full of ease.