Emily Moore
What Was Going On with That Zip Car Again?
We’re in the chairs out back drinking rosé,
our concrete patio leafy and overgrown. It’s summer
and the strings of Christmas lights I strung along the fence
are peeking through the vines. We’re trying to remember
why you once returned a Zipcar way out on Eastern Parkway.
Beach trip? Was Leo in the NICU? Maybe the night
we first brought Mia to the Sharmas’ in New Jersey?
Your left arm wasn’t in a sling. We must have had at least one kid.
Remember when we went to Italy way back before the babies?
You say, I still had two good knees. This year
we have fireflies and yellow snails back here.
You remember dropping me and Mia and her car seat
off at home. We were so sad you had to trek back out.
The kids left bubble wands out on our backyard table.
I lean back in my chair, wonder if it’s time to go indoors.
Let’s not get divorced, I say. We’ve done too many things together,
so many things we can’t remember.
Emily Moore reads “What Was Going On with That Zip Car Again? ”
Emily Moore is a poet, high school teacher, and the author of the chapbook Shuffle. Her poems have appeared in The New Yorker, The Brooklyn Poets Anthology, and elsewhere. She once read a sonnet about Beyoncé on NPR.