A million of us

intransigence: refusing to compromise or to abandon an extreme position or attitude.

elizabeth was scribbling down her mounting memories in outline form while i leafed through four years of tourist poetry & phone numbers. in 1998, amanda wrote "i love preston ray james- he is here with me now and thats why i am smiling" while others had written dylan quotes.a group of people entered the cozy tea room where she and i sat under a gigantic magnetic poetry board and they filled the corner seats and tables. the overflow sat at the end of my couch.

"so sarah, how old are you?" the ruddy cheeked, white hair man asked the girl sitting next to me.
 "sixteen," the girl replied.
"an' she got a boyfriend she is gonna marry," her mother chipped in.
the girl toyed with her necklace and mentioned that she and her boyfriend had already decided on their engagement plans.
the ruddy man gasped- in a southern fashion. "why do you want to go and do that?" he exclaimed. "you got a beautiful life ahead of you and there are a million of us out there."

elizabeth glanced over at me and i was already writing it down.