i was hoping.

I was hoping to be happy by seventeen.

School has been a sharp check mark in the roll book.

An obnoxious tuba is playing at noon because our team is going to win at night.

The teachers are too close to dying to understand.

The hallways stink of poor grades and unwashed hair.

Thus, a friend and I sat watching the water on Saturday.

Neither of us talking much, just warming ourselves by hurling large rocks at the dusty ground.

And feeling awful because San Francisco was just a postcard on a bedroom wall.

We wanted to go there.

Hitchhike under the last migrating birds.

And be with people who knew more than three chords on a guitar.

We didn't drink or smoke.

But our hair is shoulder length, wild when the wind picked up and the shadows
of this loneliness gripped loose dirt.

By bus or car.

By the sway of train or over a long bridge,we wanted to get out.

The years froze as we sat on the bank.

Our eyes followed the water.

White-tipped but dark underneath, racing
out of town.