One Coke With Two Straws Poem by Maya Reid

Today is a lazy day
I’m just layin around on the couch
Bored
Feelin a little lonely
Wishin I could go back
To yesterday
No symbolism here
I want to go back
To actually 24 hours ago
Cuz right now yesterday
I was with you
And no one could’ve told
That we’d almost fallen apart
There were no fault lines
Cuz it was no one’s fault
No cracks in our foundation
Just puppies and ferrets
And one Coke with two straws
I love one Coke with two straws
Only a dollar or two to take us back
Now it’s back to yesteryear
To three years ago, to be precise
To choir trips and salt-n-pepper chips
To rain not on our heads and falling asleep in your bed
To before everything got so busy and complicated
And just generally spiraled out of our control
We’d been riding the same river for so long
And then the sides just suddenly split
Holding hands we stretched and stretched
Shouted across the void
But shouting was so much effort
And you were so far away
I’m sorry, baby
I’m so, so sorry
But I stopped shouting
Left you with nothing more than my echoes
I didn’t let go
But I let the current pull me even farther away
I didn’t try to find some way to stay
On days when the current waned
I pulled myself back to you
And found that I didn’t have much to say
I hate to admit it, baby
But it seemed like I didn’t even know you
Anymore
Your grip was still strong no matter how we stretched
And I
I took you for granted
Thought your hands would always be there
So I chased my strong current
Left you behind
Pulled our rubber band arms till they almost snapped
I missed an important day
And then something in my head snapped
And I realized that I’d missed more than a day
I missed you
And so slowly I pulled and tugged and dragged
I crawled my way back to you
Head hung in shame
But now there were awkward silences
Nothing to say
Instead of not having to say anything
It wasn’t the way it’d been before
I felt one of your hand slip away
Someone else had come into our play
Well, into yours
And thereby into mine
And now you held one of her hands
And mine just lay flapping in the wind
Looking sort of forgotten
And I hated it
IhateditIhateditIhatedit
I wanted her out
But I realized I had no right
You had every right to a current, too
It’s so weird seeing her more than I see you
I feel like I have to complete
But I didn’t know what to do
So I let you pull her closer
And let myself drift away
And when she couldn’t be there
You came looking for me
If we stayed long enough we could almost taste
How we used to be
But one of our currents would swing by
And we’d leave us hanging in the breeze
And then
Finally
You needed me
She wasn’t there
And probably wouldn’t have understood anyway
You needed ME
Yesterday
So I went to you
Not even my own current could have kept me from us and our
Puppies and ferrets
And one Coke with two straws
Life was good
I love you
I love one Coke with two straws
And I can only hope you’ve remembered
How much you love it too
As I pray that you and her
Don’t share sodas, too
One Coke with two straws
Is the epitome of me and you
An idiosyncrasy of us two
Yesterday was for you
But I’m the one saying thanks:
I love one Coke with two straws.