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The Oregon Trail is a romantic comedy

Gregory Sherl

I’ll build you a peninsula holding another peninsula.
Know I’m serious, I’m wearing cargo pants. The pockets
are full of nails. Know I’ve never held a nail the way
I hold your chin. Loving you is easy—last fall I went pro,
kept your hand in my hand even when it was sweaty.
When I’m feeling a little naughty I imagine myself sleepy
inside you. Let this trail grab us like an old ghost. Let these
oxen pull the weight of our future love. I want to buy a mailbox
with you. I want to hold an umbrella over your umbrella,
keep you warm while I make your hair wet with my mouth.
The Oregon Trail is a super 8 film & we act like the sunniest
winter. Independence is the largest movie set with no actors:
just farmers from Illinois whose children, 13 years later,
will fall in rivers a thousand & a thousand more times
their size, so dead from a war mostly uncivil. Oh fortunate
accident, tell me why the sun only comes up once a day,
tell me why your lips pinch when you come over me.
When we are alone I tell you I want to live like a marching
band is between our sheets. You look at your fingernails,
say You smile the perfect amount.
Understand there are six billion people in the world doing six billion
different things, but I’m watching your movies, thinking
about steeping everything under your corset with my tongue.
Understand every girl I touched before you I’ll forget before
the second act. Tonight I am your British invasion.
You are my three-minute montage ache.