have you ever loved
an old-self, a husk of
person no longer there?
maybe I am an old-self
too.

the song faded and
the crowd hushed
scott spillane played
a soft horn lullaby
and I watched Koster
love us, love us soft
so soft because we
were good listeners
without knowing
one another.

You ask me what I feel & think
(because the two are distinctly their own)
about the utter absurdity
& pointlessness of life

& out the windows cars go by
& up in space meteors fly
& sitting in this vinyl booth is me;
not alive long enough to know,
but who was seen many injustices--
yet knowing not a thing to do about them,
looks to those next to me,
who have only seen worse.

I do not know why the universe keeps expanding
or why my professor gives Monday exams
or why my poems are all the same
or why people in my life keep leaving
(or why I keep pushing them out?)--
messages marked "read" with no
response or
rhyme
or reason or
rationality.

Maybe the point is that
there is no point