And I am Drinking Tequila with Ryan and Liz

And I am drinking tequila with Ryan    and Liz,

And Maxi said let’s all tell each other what we really think.

            And then we all decided…

There are these moments, like checking out at

the Dominick’s on Chicago between Hoyne and Damen

the newish one?  Yes, exactly.

I know I’ve been in Chicago longer

than it has, but whatever.

And you suddenly realize that the check-out

girl’s name is Stefanie too, though

she spells it with an “f” not her fault, blame

the parents they say

And I am drinking tequila with Ryan    and Liz,

And Maxi said let’s all tell each other what we really think.

            And then we all decided…

And there are people not this lucky being not this lucky

right now in time as Alison maybe misinterprets Josh maybe misinterprets

Al—but all of us are right  and for once

no one is just talking, but we’re all really Saying

And oh no, I think, I’ve left Hannah

To do the dishes, but I can’t get up

  can’t can’t get up and leave this, because

who knows who knows if in the next 60

years it will happen like this again,

   honesty, realness,    Becca’s winking and Amy’s

wonder at  Why, Why not me

            And everyone saying things to Micah things things that he

doesn’t seem to hear, and nobody has to

change but isn’t it

            Hey!  Isn’t it just nice sometimes to know that someone is paying that much

Attention   /   that someone else just proved you

   exist   assuming they exist   assuming you

   exist   assuming.

               We exist assuming.

And I am drinking tequila with Ryan    and Liz,

And Maxi said let’s all tell each other what we really think.

            And then we all decided…

It’s castro night, Ryan says, which I

gather to mean tequila and cigars

  And one of these is my favorite and

one of these makes me wish I weren’t so

asthmatic or Ashkenazi or whatever it is that causes

me to be so jealous of people who

can inhale or have cats

And Max and Evan are each lying on one of my legs, like sons I just haven’t

had time to have (Maybe later?)

And I am rubbing their backs like

mothers they know, but not all of.

       Like how she thought she’d be

a writer for sure            or maybe yeah maybe

a model if only those two things

were different, yeah those two,

pretty obvious, huh.

And I am drinking tequila with Ryan    and Liz,

And Maxi said let’s all tell each other what we really think.

            And then we all decided…

And somewhere (I know where, 3 blocks north of

my sublet apartment) Leslie is taking

    care of the daughter    (the exact daughter)

who never would have been born if her

     sister hadn’t,                        Not now, not for now.

      The worst happens.

      The best comes out.

 But we don’t get to just relabel the worst

as the way it should be had to be needed to be.

            There are endless options, or

 Or at least one or two.

We should talk about it sometime.

            Yep, that’s my hand.

And I am drinking tequila with Ryan    and Liz,

And Maxi said let’s all tell each other what we really think.

            And then we all decided…

Not all of this poem is true. 

I don’t think Liz actually drank

            any tequila.

    (but Ryan’s little brother Joe did.)

                                  So there were still 3.