at the corner I hit both crosswalk buttons
and wait, eyes closed, to see if I can follow
the walk sign chirps like the blind men

I choose the first street that whistles to me
and walk to the opposite corner
the way the lights rotate, you would walk circles
if you followed the signs
eventually you must choose some arbitrary avenue
and either wait for it to welcome you
or test your luck in traffic

I choose left

then look up, hoping
to invent some new constellation
but the big parking lot halogens
bleed like blue inked milk into the sky
and the stars are specks, painted over

maybe for the better, I know too well
that I would see those galaxies spiraling
and dig dig dig into big big big questions
hitting all the major points
time and space and self and purpose,
purpose

and the mental ******* would be
a million endless tangents like a million little bits of magnesium
flashing in a firework, brighter than those parking lot halogens
but like every independence day
they flash and fizzle and then the sky is just smoky

and I start to feel small
so I walk into Big Lots to calm down

rummaging through the shelves,
not a single pad of paper outside of monthly planners
not a single blank sheet, not a single open page
not a single ******* one

no one wants to buy anything unless they know it has a purpose first

otherwise, it’ll end up in their desk,
blank and staring every time the drawer gets cracked open

and no one will have an answer for it