The trick was the sweat on your feet
and the stick on the palms of your hands
trailing like a bug leaving slime
cupping around the base and sliding to the top.
If you could reach the net
you were one of us.
You didn’t have to be strong, I wasn’t.
Sinewy muscles poking through skin
on lanky arms like knots in a rope.
I could slither up a few feet higher
and see the cracks where the rooftops
met the walls.
The others calling below me
surprised. Dirty feet pounding on the pavement
echoing. Callused skin preventing
the bits of gravel from poking
in. Scraped knees picked over
until they scarred. The tough
exterior marking us as each other’s
under the same streetlights,
belonging.
“I wake up out of your dream”
I wake up out of your dream
disoriented from your waves of sleep
your eyelids fluttering filtering in the light
Our minds layering on top one another
magnets matching a prize in the center
like wooden Russian dolls
In your dream I am half blind
fighting against bodily instincts
to look where I’m going, to use the brake
The brake never works in your dream.
Driving a runaway truck into traffic
hoping for the best
Haley DiRenzo is a writer, poet, and practicing attorney specializing in eviction defense. Her poetry and prose have appeared in Eunoia Review, 50-Word Stories, and Bright Flash Literary Review, among others. She lives in Colorado with her husband and dog.
