Eating Popcorn in My Underwear I Realize I Love You
by Tanner Barnes
Even though I’m 1168 days sober—
I’m perpetually sitting on someone’s
floor, sipping water & vodka, squinting
and squeezing my leg as someone shuffles
a dildo deck of playing cards, a plastic phallus printed
on the back of a two of hearts that neatly
folds itself into my hand. A flush. Or maybe,
I’m still a child and my uncles are smoking
long cigars and pot, playing five-card-draw
in a back room and my brother and I are
at the table. We cough. They cough. They fold,
and we win a little bit of change to empty
into the mouth of a middle school vending
machine. And although you don’t know either
of those me’s, I feel like you do, as I bend
a fresh deck we bought at some thrift store,
surely first purchased by an over eager
father hell bent on teaching his son how
to rob a man blind over a few hands of
cards. O how its stiffness caves to the pressure
of my thumb and index, concave then convex.
You and I use popcorn and pennies and our
bodies as wagers, I bust, you bust. We both
yell blackjack. And I want you to know
every game of cards I’ve ever been dealt—
that you aren’t the first I’ve played
this game with, but damn, do I hope
you’re my last because yesterday
I watched my neighbor hang up a banner
that read HAPPY BIRTHDAY across
the arch of her front door. And this morning
they carried her out on a stretcher. Because
last week when our drive to the beach turned
torrential and I couldn’t see the road
or taillight in front of me, you made me stop
at that gas station, bought me a sweet tea
and a Nerds rope and a newspaper that you
opened up and we took turns reading headlines
until the rain cleared. Because I love you damnit
and how today you wore nothing but yellow,
head to toe, how you eat a lemon clean off the rind,
how you are set on fire by the smallest patch
of roadside flowers. Because when I told
you that I nearly lost it while waiting
in line at Aldi— you put a bag of popcorn
in the microwave, grabbed my fist, opened my palm
and put a pack of cards in it because you know
I need something to do with my hands.