One Small Step

People who owned TVs and those
who jammed into bars or friends’ homes
watched, and breathed the same air, the world over. 
 
At summer camp, we ten girls breathed 
air tinged with pine and damp sneakers, 
hair bound on rollers or hair that fanned

down the backs of bathrobes.
We filled one bed, a knot so tight 
we felt each others’ sunburns. 

On the blanket, a transistor radio fizzed
and snapped like a lit pile of sticks. 
One girl had wrapped the antenna 

with wire from the arts and crafts shack
to pull a stronger signal. 
No luck. The man’s words, pale 

smoke, sprayed up out of the box
from what we believed was the future, 
that incomprehensible distance.