Eileen

Loved you since I was little, on the playground break-time

-brawled with you and your mismatched cuffs, tufts of Eileen

-brown hair pinned down like a sheep under a sheet. You wanted love

the way boys got loved, begged for it with all that Eileen

swagger and jaw. When we bump together at the bar, I’m still trying to tackle

the ball from under you, kick my voice through the goal posts of Eileen’s

throat. Ripping our rumors from the jukebox. Years, I thought I was a dog

wrestling with what I was not allowed to eat, climbing Eileen

-shaped trees in my fresh whites, getting in fights with any boy

who claimed he was more fuckable than some dyke. Eileen,

my hilltop-hike, my lucky-strike, watching from the other side

of every woman I’ve kissed—leather-bombed, corner-bound, Eileen,

you never left me lonely. We’ve been night-terror brokers, six-pack-it

-till-it-kills-us smokers. I hope we make it to be quitters. Leave an Eileen

-sized hole in the city and slip out the last train, steal motorbikes,

build kites, christen every sweetheart on the M-track Eileen

and behind your back I’ll tell girls in cafs how fortunate I am

to have found something I could chase down all my life—Eileen.