I’m listening to this song,
early in the morning
when raindrops decorate the dark bus windows.

"I guess I'm not prepared"

The pattern of words crawls into my brain,
tickling nerves, shaking loose memories
of the night before, a maelstrom of screams
about my college choices, future plans, and grades at school,
of doors slammed mid-sentence in my mother’s face.

"Family is all I'll ever have and need"

Everyday verses swamp nerves, then brain.
I **** sideways and
knock shoulders with my bus seat mate.
On the backs of my eyelids, I see
my mother kicking a hole in my door, 
memories of cracking wood is
garbled by rain and guitar strums. 

"Pick up my personal pieces"

I've listened to this song before:
in the car ride home after a tedium of classes,
through crackling speakers in bright grocery aisles,
and bouncing headphones when I run circles on the track,

But not in the dark of the early morning,

on a trembling bus speckled with rain water.

"Good things are over fast"

— quoted lines from “The Man” by Ed Sheeran