One night
when I was twelve years old
on a field trip some place
I can't remember, my friends
and I bought supersoakers

and turned the hotel parking lot
into our arena of saturation.
We hid behind cars
running through the darkness
that lay between the streetlights.
Seditious laughter ubiquitous
across the pavement.

Within ten minutes
my father came outside
grabbed me by the forearm
and led me inside to our room
with an unfamiliar grip.

Before I could invoke objection,
acquaint him with how foolish
he had made me look in front
of my friends,
he derided me for being so naïve.
Told me I couldn’t be out here
acting the same as these white boys—
can't be pretending to shoot guns
can't be running in the dark
can’t be hiding behind anything
other than your own teeth.

I know now how scared
he must have been,
how easily I could have fallen
into the obsolescence of the night.
That some man would mistake
this water for a good reason
to wash all of this away.