We scuffed across the wide sidewalks, 3 AM *****
persuading us the dim-lit bridge wouldn’t fall away beneath
our curiosity to see the university’s emptiness, content
in August’s stagnancy. I tried to picture thousands of strangers
walking different paths to reach their point B,
but soon we stepped off yellow-toned brick and I saw hippies
laying on the ground outside a pub, smoking joints.
One woman with hip-length dreads, her face as wrinkled
as crumpled love letters hidden behind my dresser, pointed
and said, You’ll forget yourself some day.

Months later, I blinked awake in the tank as dawn crept
through my cell bars, quietly, like the disappointment on my birthdays
or Mom’s sighs when she browsed the mail for child support checks
never sent by my train-wreck, truck deck loving old man
who ****** me off when I mistook him for that self-righteous cop
hell-bent on teaching me a lesson of respect.
He had that patronizing presence, and it blinded me with magma
rage I felt in my arms, through my knuckles, right to his rib cage.
I still don’t remember the way back to that dingy pub.