AT DUNBARTON BRIDGE

She was a flower child
in 1968
Tina heading for the Golden Gate
with her cursed life fallen behind
from an every day's appeal
waiting for her life to get better
here at an early hour peal
from the first hour school bell
she puts on her Christmas sweater
marked with a sports letter
from Tom her boyfriend
both needing an innocent vacation
to mountain climb or ski and escape
from their family's aggravation
during an absent wintry sunlight
away from mad parental storms
Tina returning with the bouquet
with a warmed over perfumed scent
from her sister's Las Vegas wedding
she not invited by reservation
yet was able to  secretly attend
and reduced to bloodshot ashen eyes
of laughter and tears
her head in a chocolate cupcake
she took from the head table
tells me that by her teenage days
she is a runway
a student of much swagger
with many unearned fears
yet able ,well read and intelligent
far beyond her years
knowing by her interlaced
marked up hands
she is a folk singer
on the guitar,
telling me she was
always shadowed by her sister
named Summer
and her father
who was a drunkard,
a hot under the collar pianist
and the only drummer
in an old boy Birmingham band
who threatened daggers to her
if she didn't perform
when she became this runaway
and escaped backstage
from her barracks in the dorm
with a backpack in the night,
calling out to the sleeping family
of Tom at the door
of the elementary school
who do the cooking
and are janitors
Tina asking them for a bit
of pin money
to sustain her for a week
as they going out to Twin Peaks.