The people in this town sit by their
windows, breathing on anything that passes.

They sit on dead Volvos bearing
Bluetooth stereos on their shoulders,
where the words are streaming.

Can’t get away from, running like water in the brain, night thoughts.

They run up the bill.

Ironically I can’t pay them mind only attention.

Sleep service is different from lip but leave a tip in my jar please.

now when I visit
my friends are always pushing cribs
into emergency rooms
or they’re trying to run away from unemployment
riding their grandparents’ bikes
through overgrown backyards
where our old high school teachers
spend their summers

Then one night during my stay there, a heavy rainstorm hit our area. The rain came pattering down against my small window, heavier than I could recall in quite some time. Outside I saw a spider’s web, with a giant spider braving the rain. The wind tossed and turned the web furiously, but still the spider continued to hold on.

The stress I feel from this election
affects my mind and my midsection.

I read the news as vivisection
and no disease escapes detection.

By regretting some of the poor decisions I made when I was younger, I was invalidating what I had been through. In other words, I was negating the path I had taken, as if it were a series of mistakes. Nonetheless, all these “blunders” were the same stepping stones I needed to become the person I am today.