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I thought I had gotten away from this part of my childhood,
but I turned at lettuce and ran into my cousin Linden
in the grocery store last Thursday.
He was delighted and dragged me back to their house 
to observe more of their childish games.

Unlike in the movies where they pop a gunny sack over your head 
and capture you, 
Linden enticed me in a different whole-hearted way that made me
want to be dragged back into their drama.   
With methodical guilt that appealed to 
my niceness, and the reminder we are “blood” after all, 
my notoriously personable
first cousin coaxed me back into his brother Tweedle-Man’s troubled waters.

I sat mesmerized, watching them do all the stuff they used to do, 
when we were kids, only harder and meaner.
This used to be my circus, but I had long ago given up the three rings.
They are going on sixty, acting twenty-two, proud of their inflexibility, 
and retention of youth.
I admire their eagerness to never change things 
that have never in any way worked for them.
They valiantly hang on to a selfish life that has 
never created a fulfillment for either of them, and has helped no one.

I resign myself to the socialized fact 
That for a few more hours I will sit here,
pretending politeness.  I do not exchange phone numbers or tell
them where I am living or with whom. 
They do not care. It is all about them.
The ringmaster and the clown.  

It would be an inconvenience for them to reach out again.
They are too inebriated and too high in other ways to find me again 
Or even remember who I am or that I still exist. 

I sit patiently a few more minutes.
Waiting for them to bring on the dancing bears.
Tweedle-man is wearing oversized glasses that light up. “Funny huh?”
Linden falls off the couch, laughing maniacally.  
Just a few more minutes…



Written 3-17-2019
Contest:  Bring on the Dancing Bears       
Sponsor: John Lawless
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