he is heeding the call
of the hobo train
while i still have
bruises on my veins
the fleeting moment when
we discovered poetic terrorism
still pulses in my
wildly beating heart
i’m terrified to
make the same mistake
the smell of alcohol
on one’s breath at
ten o’clock in the morning
takes me back to
darker days
when i counted my dimes
hoping for enough for
a pack of smokes
and every sunrise
was an urgent call for freedom
from those suddenly empty streets
