Welcome to The Blue Route!

For The Girls By The Drained Pool

By: Ryan Rader

“As for measure and other technical apparatus, that’s just common sense: if you’re going to buy a pair of pants you want them to be tight enough so everyone will go to bed with you” -Frank O’Hara

I wore those pants in the snow,
My treaded boots displacing powder

like dust in the expanding universe,
Ankles kept safe in white socks,

the weather speaking in waves.
I remember six distinct summers

of you, the wild dancers,
Punk-hipster art-fag fashion-

-istas, mosh-pit, kickflipping
crowd-surfing social butterflies.

We may swap peeks from laces up
to a cuffed leg and nod politely

in certain social situations, bus
stations, venues, dives, but I am

a fraud, an observer in your clothing,
Know me as the inventor of nothing,

willingly assimilated by my subjects,
and in my mind a skateboarder pauses

in the air and I envy the fearless,
with molecules so slow they stop

time. Tight denim and duct-taped shoes
hovering over waxed rotating splinters,

wheels buzzing the mouths of
the girls on the lip of the pool,

their legs dangling into echoes,
flipping their hair in a chorus.

Ryan J. Rader, at age eight, told a group of fellow children that Santa Claus was not real, and was subsequently grounded by his parents. He has been unable to tell the truth ever since.


	For The Girls By The Drained Pool By: Ryan Rader “As for measure and other technical apparatus, that’s just common sense: if you’re going to buy a pair of pants you want them to be tight enough so everyone will go to bed with you” -Frank O’Hara I wore those pants in the snow, My treaded boots displacing powder like dust in the expanding universe, Ankles kept safe in white socks, the weather speaking in waves. I remember six distinct summers of you, the wild dancers, Punk-hipster art-fag fashion- -istas, mosh-pit, kickflipping crowd-surfing social butterflies. We may swap peeks from laces up to a cuffed leg and nod politely in certain social situations, bus stations, venues, dives, but I am a fraud, an observer in your clothing, Know me as the inventor of nothing, willingly assimilated by my subjects, and in my mind a skateboarder pauses in the air and I envy the fearless, with molecules so slow they stop time. Tight denim and duct-taped shoes hovering over waxed rotating splinters, wheels buzzing the mouths of the girls on the lip of the pool, their legs dangling into echoes, flipping their hair in a chorus. Ryan J. Rader, at age eight, told a group of fellow children that Santa Claus was not real, and was subsequently grounded by his parents. He has been unable to tell the truth ever since.