Cheap Memories Held Dear

Plastic pizza hut glasses
Covered with decorative
Lumps and bumps
In nicotine yellowish
Brown, filled with 
Soda stream pop
The bubbles fighting
Past the syrup until
They are stopped
By tomato and cheese
Smeared noses 
Wrinkled in delight
At all the grease and
Fat and sugary 
Expression of my 
Loving attempts at
Creating a little
Cheap and easy joy.  

Little girl standing in
Roppongi wearing 
A quilted pink coat, 
Shiny patent sneakers
Hair in a pineapple puff
Holding onto
The chibi body of a 
Grostesquely blonde 
Cinderella dolly 
Who she insisted was 
The object of her affections,
Grinning in front of 
Christmas decorations
Declaring it was 2004
In Tokyo illuminations
Stuck in a photo now
Who ran towards me
Towards my hug
Calling out mommy
And talking about
Forever and love. 

A quarter spent
On an iron pony ride
At the zoo, little boy
Too small to balance
Held there by my
Shaking hand
Sister laughing
At the giraffe
Improbable creature
I admit, but not 
Mechanical
After all. 
Long tongue 
Licked the leaves
And they laughed
Forever holding hands
The past is 
A long lost land. 

A tank of gas
A drive across
The mesa
That went on forever
And never stopped
Until the mountain ran 
Out and the plains
Set in.
A campfire
A smile
The rain. 
Los Angeles
Palm tree
Oregon gloom
Washington floods
Minnesota mud.

What is here today
Is gone by the morning
What happiness
There is in love
Fades and drowns
And is lost in the 
Cooling of the
Blood.