Day One (2011) - How to Laugh

http://blog.writersdigest.com/poeticasides/2011/04/01/2011AprilPADChallengeDay1.aspx

For today's prompt, write a "what got you here" poem. For instance, write a poem about a mode of transportation like your car, bike, horse, etc. Or write a poem about what "got you here" as a human being or writer (like what got you started writing, perhaps). Or write a poem about what brought you to this blog. Or whatever other interpretation you might have.

My parents recently re-told the story of how they met, so I decided to incorporate it into a poem. It's one of my favorite stories because, after all this time, they still laugh when they tell it.

Here's my first draft effort for the first day of Poem A Day 2011:

How To Laugh

They met in high school
At a record store where they
Made nonsense sentences
Out of album titles:
Get Yer Ya Yas Out at The Kiln House
Death Walks Behind You with A Pocket Full of Miracles
The Man Who Sold the World for Leftover Wine is Paranoid

Then they were friends
Who met at the county fair
Where he got drunk
And threw up
On the Tilt-A-Whirl and her friend left
An enormous red hickey on his neck
And he didn’t even know it was there

Then he dated her best friend
And she smoothed lotion
On her long bronze legs
And wore a copper halter
That made him sit up when he saw her
Come up that sidewalk like a sun-kissed goddess
And he took his arm off the best friend’s shoulder

Then he asked her out
They went to a pizza place
She wore a mini-dress
And when he pulled out the chair
He just kept going, and she fell flat
On her ass
And laughed

Then he reached down and took her hand.

Now we’re sitting on the patio
Drinking coffee and his hand
Still rests with hers
And I say,
“It would have been over
Then and there
If you pulled that on me.”



And He smiles and shakes his head.
Thirty seven years have passed
Thirty seven years of pranks and puns
And sickness and health, and he says,
“That’s how I knew we’d get along
Because right from the start
We both knew how to laugh.”