jean jacket missing a few buttons and teeth

it is a shame

i am a failed computer

i cannot restart

myself from weighing this

heavy loneliness

that surrounds and suffocates

like people on the subway

that get off the next stop

leaving a little while

to breathe

to recollect

to miss even

the warmth and bodies

and knowing you’re here

for they’re there

and we’re all apart

then another group

breaks in

computers in hand

and an elbow

in your gut

and it makes you pee your pants

a little

which is a shame

because these are new pants

and your phone is in your pocket

weeping electric cries

while there’s no going back now

no restarting

no moving at all

*

it takes two

to

survive this world

the one you could’ve been

is sacrificed

for the one you are

*

he was beat

dead or dying

on the cement

warming the cracks

with poems and thoughts

he hadn’t written yet

that i hadn’t written yet either

for i couldn’t

there was nothing more to write

with him there

dead or dying

becoming something else

besides himself

not taking help

but getting up

falling

weeping

writing a story

i didn’t understand

or know the end of

though it was there

falling

weeping

dead and dying