jasmine raze i was about eleven, and she was about eleven, and her brother was a year or two younger. i met her in a park we didn't visit much. i was taciturn, maybe because she was beautiful and i was shy, maybe because i thought it would make me more interesting if i didn't say a lot. she didn't mind either way. she did almost perfect cartwheels and the long brown silk that was her hair was blown by the wind her moving made. when it was time to go she smiled and said she'd see me again and we'd play again, though she'd done most of the playing and i'd done most of the watching, and i went home and sat on the living room floor with my back to the couch and typed into some primitive early nineties digital day planner that i'd made a new friend. the date was there, but the date is lost now like the planner was lost, broken or gone or sleeping in some distant mosaic of treasure and dirt and discarded toys. we wouldn't play again because i wouldn't see her again. there have been many names since, with many memories and feelings attached, but there was only ever the one jasmine, braver with her body than i dared to be then, and likely braver than i would be now. 140203 ... unhinged a smell of night summer sex blooms 140204 what's it to you? who go blather from