I became jealous of my friend;
He hung around the intersections
Just a bit too long.

He used to slump around
In the corners of my eyes
And I didn't notice him when he'd frown--
We didn't notice him--until he hung around
That intersection for longer than we'd care to think.

I became jealous
Because he vanished
Right to that street corner
When he thought
No one would care but the coroner,
Right to the asphalt that received him--
Soft,
As I hoped my own
Last moments
Would be.

When I saw him,
Mama said he was sleeping.
He looked like he was,
But the lights were dim;
His arm cradled his head
The way he used to sleep
On his desk, in class
And for all I knew,
He was.

They said he was driving
Like he was late for something,
Like had he not been driving
Exactly 65.32 miles per hour
He'd have been late,
And it was only afterwards
That he'd figured out that he was
Right on time.

And when he arrived, his car blossomed into
A beautiful metal flower, and when it fully bloomed
He was the fruit
Which fell.
And all I could do was recruit the strength
I'd left at home on accident by the drain
The same one that ****** him into that downward cyclone,
Confused him and made him believe he was alone--
Not to just think or to have a hunch,
But to really believe it
To the point where he needed to expunge
Himself.
No.
No, no, no.
Not like this.

And so, now, I sit at the intersection
Chucking rocks with my weepy hand
At my grayish concrete reflection
Trying to see if he'll come around again.
I'm still
And still kind of mad within
Because life's not fair,
I'm jealous because he found the answer
And left us all to figure it out
On shards of glass
Pieces of metal
and intersections,
Which too long
He hung about.