i hunch my shoulders even though i'm trying to straighten my spine
i'm standing alone at this bus stop; the morning is darker and colder
than me, somehow. i clench my teeth against a bitter wind and
try not to think about the way i barely notice the chill cutting through me.
there's a death grip around my ribs - i struggle to inhale properly
but sometimes i find myself breathing just enough to make a small dent on the air

the combined weight of my phone in the left pocket of my skinny jeans
and my hand gripping my wallet in the right pocket
has my waistband slipping below my hips, jeans just-barely holding on,
and the precariousness of their position - half falling, half hanging -
has me thinking that they fit me better than they seem to.
i relate to them more than i've related to anybody in a long time.

the sun is only just rising at the edge of the eastern sky,
casting an eerie winter glow over this ice-bitten village.
i like these early mornings, my fellow villagers,
the few that are out and about as early as i am,
ambling sleepily to their sunrise starts
and even though i drank my morning coffee, i'm drunk on my lust for sleep.

i blink my bleary eyes and blatantly stare at the old couple
cautiously hobbling over slippery cobblestone,
walking sticks in their outer hands and inner palms clasped
together. the way they grip each other tightly tells me
they trust each other not to let the other fall;
the rings on their fingers tell me they fell for each other a long time ago
and i wonder how many times they pulled each other down over the years

as i catch sight of my bus approaching, slow behind a nervous driver
i'm left thinking about people, and college, and life
how everything seems simultaneously meaningful and meaningless,
all for something - yet, really, kind of all for nothing.
i could walk away and go home, settle into my bed and let sleep pull me under
away from my thoughts, naked and no longer bound by a binder,
comfortable in my skin the way i can never be in public

i don't. i step on the bus, and flash my bus pass at the driver
climb the stairs to sit in the front chairs by the windows
watch life pass by as the engine rumbles into motion.
i'm painfully aware of the way my ribs protest when i slouch in my seat
and my bed tempts me once more as i yawn into my weather-chapped hand.
i don't. college calls, friends await. perhaps it's all pointless
sometimes that's what my philosophy class teaches me
but i'd much rather live it out and see