Boomerang

Back at the airport.

Same chairs,
     same fluorescent honesty,
             different reason.

This one was a boomerang trip—
                           in,
                          out,
             just long enough
           for a medical deal
      and some concrete proof
  that healing is a real verb.

Ava and I—
    both on the mend,
    both somehow *talking* more

    than we ever did before.

Plans.
Logistics.

Future versions of us with calendars that behave.

It feels very family. (which is its own kind of medicine)

And now—
    Atlanta again.

I’m ready for Irby’s.

Ready for the office.

Hungry to hunt a condo
           and finally
          find a joint
    that knows my name.

And yeah—
    ready for Mari,
    if she’s into it.

Miss Coal’s kisses, too—
       those unlicensed,
            unregulated
     little love-stamps

     he hands out like he owns the world.

We did get Monday night,
   the kind that makes you forget
   there’s such a thing as “too soon”

   or “too much.”

Steelers played like a crime scene,
     got bounced from the playoffs,
     and still—

I’d take that night
    ten out of ten times.

Because it wasn’t about the score.

It was about the way it felt
   to be back in the right orbit.

She called that trip a tease.

I corrected her: “No. An appetizer.”

She said, “I’m hungry.”

And me—
    sitting here with boarding time
    and restless hands,
    thinking about Atlanta like it’s a plate

    being set down in between us.

Boomerang:
          thrown with purpose,
          coming back with momentum,
          returning to the place
          where the best part of me

          remembers how to breathe.

Wheels up soon.

And if the universe behaves
               even halfway…

I’ll be there
     with a smile,
          a seat,
            and something warm…

                ready to satiate.