We are the poor.
We have no wealth.
Don't ask about our mental health
In fact walk past us.
Don't ask why
Just do not look us in the eye
Especially if you knew us before
When we wore socks and brushed our teeth
And hadn't given up and sank beneath
The awful maelstrom in our brain
Of fear, pain and damning shame.

We are the shadow people
But I see you,
And I know that you have shadows too.

When the day is finally through,
And there is little else to do,
I shall watch the sun go down,
And colours lighting up the town.

Red, green, yellow, white and blue,
Neon and oil and candles too,
On streets, in parks and houses all,
When night makes its gentle call.

Then I will off to please my mind,
In a quiet place that I can find,
With drink in hand to sit me down,
And sip the colours of the town.

Haven’t seen you writing in a while
Been stuck inside your brain
Painting pictures of your pain
The thing is your not a painter
None of it makes sense

Your supposed to be a writer
You  threw away your pen
Haven’t seen you writing since
Angry for no reason
Shouting at the wall

Started a fire in your apartment
When you set fire to your poems
Fire department said you were lucky
Landlord evicted you
So you live back home with your mom

She tells her friends “your recovering”
They say “from drinking?”
She says, “No, from art.”
Your not yourself anymore
Not without your work

You write from time to time
A word may escape from your mind
Find its way to paper
Only to find itself alone
Thrown away back into the void

To ash and stolen
Our home among the stars
No retaliation
Even escape but a distant dream
Though by sheer grace
Did some survive
Scattering themselves far and wide
Among the ever twilight cosmos
One day I know they will return
They must!
For in them lies the spark
The last remaining hope
Of a humanity without a home

I remember we took a walk most days that
allowed it. In step down the sidewalks,
we might have laughed at something
or another that I had said,
there was plenty of laughter
to go around then—and plenty of sidewalks.
They stretched around the river and
laced up the streets past the gym
where we met towards the house
that became our home.
Walking back, you might have smiled
or playfully slapped away my hand
from the small of your back before
leaning in to kiss my cheek.

Affection was neither of our strong suits
but it was a suit you wore better
than I did.

I remember you wore a black coat on our
first date and shrugged
out of it as we walked up to
the restaurant—baring a lone shoulder
and my first glimpse into your past.
I held the door and you rearranged
your hair, hiding it again.

I remember the scar was barely noticeable then,
me just a stranger and concerned
with so many other things.
How would the food taste?
How would the service be?
Would you like me enough to walk
those sidewalks home for another drink?

It was not until later that I would
find out what a burden that
small slip of flesh truly was.

I remember you had a slight fear of those
sidewalk cellar doors,
just enough to step around them each time
with a bit of a blush on your cheek
as if it were something to be ashamed of.

How strange, these things you remember.

This place to me now is not a city,
but an old ruin full and full of sidewalks
and, like a child with imagined lava,
I fear to touch them for the burn
of what remembrance they might bring.