Bobby

There's only half a kid to write, tiny stories unsorted
like toys left out in an attic. He taught me to play adventure, to climb
up to my face in mud and trust he'd pull me out, to tunnel
for longnecks with my toes, which numbers and letters
meant the best water gun. I was afraid of snakes. He was afraid
of nothing. I cast a love spell, I pined: would I see him

with our mothers? Would he see me get skinny? Would his lips curve
in the same wary smile when we'd meet each other grown,
without Barbies to break or hermit crabs to capture? Once we lost
each other in a corn maze on the cusp of teen hood, and again
I'm mouthing his name, empty paths all around. Again
I'm sitting with his toys, not ready to put them back in place.