Far Rockaway

      Not this one

      says the woman on the platform

      this one

      is going to Lefferts

      you want the next one

      the one to Far Rockaway

      and I nod

      though I’ve never been there

      though it’s cold

      as I picture it

      white dunes

      Far Rockaway

      waves

      with grey hair

      I remember that movie

      where the actor known for comedy

      wears a black jacket

      is melancholy

      in winter skips work

      and rides the train past blackbirds

      all day

      far boroughs

      and his own reflection

      what awaits him

      is a beach in winter

      gulls and stone

      in one scene

      he just stands there

      spinning

      in another

      a stranger with blue hair

      peeks her head

      above the train seat

      they hate each other

      sporadically

      share a cigarette

      and fall in love

      I was sixteen and my heart hurt

      to watch it

      it made me want to be older

      and lonesome

      handsome

      with brown hair

      and an empty pier

      a winter

      where I could be alone

      that year I read A Coney Island

      of the Mind met Genevieve

      mimicked my body

      with pillows stuffed beneath my sheets

      sneaking out to the lake

      beneath a pink sky

      she kissed me

      silver clasp and vodka

      yellow bra

      falling off her shoulders

      that actor

      the last I heard

      stopped being funny

      grew a beard

      voted

      fell in love

      with a woman

      thin as a wing

      who OD’d

      a quiet suicide

      of white pills

      for two winters

      I read Genevieve