asterisk

It’s something about the smoke, the slow unshaping of each breath. It’s something about the aperture never quite adjusted right. The light softly washing over skins and surfaces, the dark paying little heed. Another shift from hip to shoulder, another balancing of bads. I burn down here in the toss and turn, sleepless and astir. Another day like any other, staring at the ceiling. Another day like any other, now that the special is long gone.

These days it’s always nothing doing. These days are all past their use by dates. Day and night and nothing in between. The stars appear, the stars depart, comporting themselves by shine and constellation. No more blood, no more breath, just the bottles tossed into the ocean without messages tendered. Wide awake in the late anthropocene, deep into the slip away.

There’s always the words left unsaid. There’s always the way you wished you’d played it. The comebacks and the repartee, the questions left unanswered. Everybody turns out strangers, the dead don’t return your calls. Every record set an asterisk as the numbers all accumulate, the lies playing on repeat. What you were, what you wanted, just scribbles on an envelope. The self another shadow spilling down the wall.