Why did we do all that? What were we looking for
when we stood conspicuously outside our cars on summer nights
in our madras shirts, white levis and loafers without socks
along the parking diagonals in the median lane of Balson Avenue
in front of the high school that indentured us most of the year?

Why did we drive in my convertible chasing endless rumors of girls
or midnight idylls in forbidden swimming pools that lapped in affluent backyards,
air conditioners humming like the breath of their sleeping owners?

Why did I hate the Marquees, who appeared to have real girls and newer cars
and to strut, not walk, in the eternal parade through our daytime high school halls?

Why did the world wait to come alive until it had drowned in Night
and only our headlights could show us the way,

and why did I feel my blood beating suddenly an inclusive rhythm
the night that gang of paroled convicts who called themselves the 69ers
came out of hell with chains to beat people up, and a guy
from our football team whose name I can’t remember
screamed “Lemme at ‘em! ” and dove in their open car window,

or the night—this was before we were even old enough to drive—
when muscular, blonde huns no more than 18 but looking huge to us
came screaming out of nowhere as we talked and strolled
through Heman Park at 3 AM and chased us running for our lives
a block beyond the other side of the park, all the way up
to Stanley’s front porch, where we woke up his dad to save us,

or in those forbidden, backyard swimming pools
when a light went on in the house and we had to flee,
and someone always did a last cannonball to roil the water?

Ah, you strange admixture, numbed nerves
and genuine yearning twisting around one another
to open those unfathomable gates of Night!

c 2004 by Max Reif