Kalsarikänni

--Michael Bazzett

Let’s put on our childhood clothes

and walk the secret streets.

Let’s remember that in Finland

they have a word that means

drinking at home, alone,

in your underwear. Let’s feel

the give in our bones again,

soft and green as flower stems.

You might not be my brother.

But you’re as close as we both

might get. Let’s use the sides

of our hands to scrape forts

out of the road-sand snowplows

left in the gutters, then watch

as they melt in rain. Let’s remember

old songs again. You can tell me

how chessboards lie about

the rules of war, how Mother’s

sigh was a descending note

that sharpened into nothingness.

Then we’ll each go our separate

ways, slip into our humming

houses, and drink one last pull

of starlight straight from the bottle.