She did this song
where the chorus goes
Pushing dirty water on the bleachers of love
and afterwards I asked
Beaches of love?
and she said
Bleachers of love
and I said
I don’t know what that means
and she said
it came from a private joke.
It doesn’t really mean anything.

So I said,
Isn’t that a problem
that you’re singing for other people
out in the world
in the hopes that they understand it
and appreciate it
and maybe want to buy it
and give you a million dollars for it?
and she said, A million dollars?
What are you: forty eight?
and I said Maybe?!

She looked at me
and said
You don’t have to take it so serious.
It’s just a song.
It doesn’t have to mean anything.
and I replied
Then what’s the point of writing it?
Why don’t you just stay home
and play it to nobody
and hope your cats give you the million?
and she said,
I don’t have a cat.
and I said, Whatever!

You’re pretty cute when you’re frustrated,
she said
and I muttered while mind wandered.
She’s just trying to distract me from my central thesis,
I thought,
but I shall not be so easily swayed.
It is important to use a common language in the communication arts, I thought,
Even if she thinks I’m cute.
Wait. She thinks I’m cute?

Really?
I said, but she hadn’t really said that at all.
She’d gone long ago
and I guess the real words
had gotten swept away
on the tides
of the beaches
of my reverie.