you know, it's mornings like these...
lonely mothers on a bus
a man whose expression says less than I do
forlorn looks, contagious
passing from face to face
on air so thick like syrup
leaving impatient hands and eyes
sticky with fatigue

and comfort I take
for granted with ease
but on mornings like these...

out a window
I pick a fight
with an absent god
he stares back

and wary feet carry me here
I've never seen a place like this
so many people, their minds
somewhere else or maybe sleeping
they don't want to be here
who think of nothing but
what they don't have
and where they aren't

I pass my own eyes
a symptom of stillness--
the disease that kills itself
on mornings like these...

this is a place dead and thriving
a city hope-barron, bustling
blank, blank faces
float on a restless breeze

moving, always moving
but going nowhere

this ghost town abandoned
yes, but no one ever left