I used to know what people did on weekends.
Where people went and who with.
I used to clap hands in dives and
pat backs and match light deprived
dilated iris blacks and catch ember breaths
close to campfire conversations fed
with shreds and bits of the week's shed tourniquets.
I used to know what people did on weekends.
By day or by night and it was cool
to be another particle wave
in the thirty sixth hour accelerator
set to collide and divide my mind
into a bubble chamber of spirals and aerials
alongside everyone else
trying to reach a more stable state and
exploding instead.
I used to know people,
dedicating myself
to the call and null
to the rush and pull
to the shrill and lush
to the bang and the buck,
but like hearts,
times change.
Now I only know me,
the hillsides once dotted with little fires are
so far distant I
cannot see, but know and take
some solace in not being
the last man on Earth
still walking beneath the stars
because when the wind blows right
I can smell the touch of their dressings
to gold and red glowing sticks
circled in stones,
wounds bathing in the heat, and
though I only know me
crossing time in single, determined, steps
I know I am not alone.
