Homecoming, sixteen

Twenty-eight years after first writing this poem, I am still messing around with it. Anyone else have a poem they just can't leave alone?

Instead of getting a friend to feed her fish, one of my kids secretly brought them along on a a little family trip (don’t worry, they survived). Poem first posted here (but has been revised a million and one times).

Bored and cold, we watch blue bulks
of rushing man slam rushing man.
You tap on rails, your fingers thin—
falling, twice, to brush my hand

and grasp it when we leave the game
and see your white car’s window smashed.
Before we sweep the inside clean
you swish through shards to find your stash.

At home, you call your dad, and wait—
your head in lap, my fingers then
(while blue-robed mother fades back to bed)
smooth across your sallow skin.

In the silence, we watch the swish
fan-tail, bowl-bound, of my fish 
endlessly lapping the shallow water
mouthing words she cannot utter.

Night of the dance, you're back at my door:
thin black tie, limp-necked rose
slowing on a crowded court, selling acid
to orange-lip girls. My window up

they rave silent words in smoke.
Undertone, I hear you groan
Idiots gave me the wrong bill
and wave the cash as you turn the wheel.

(This is before the homecoming dance.)

After, we go to dinner
at brown-lit bad golf course cuisine.
Of this, I don’t remember much
but dancing little, and feeling obscene

your hand against my velvet back
saying, You’re a snob.

Curled hair, borrowed pearls
treading the deepening water
I mouth words about myself 
I cannot swallow nor utter.