depression is like finding
a phillip morris pack
of cigs left behind the drywall
in an old burb splitlevel tract house
now being renovated.

you bust down a wall
to make room for
a new space only
to find old ways,
cute and smarmily nostalgic.

billboards of then,
marlboro men.

it's no michelangelo.

the not-too-far-back past
is a looseleaf ghost
binding you in three rings,
one of which won't snap
shut all the way, letting you
be here and there, drinking
your dumb boring blood
like a can of tab soda
from the cafeteria vending machine

replacing your numbered collarbone
with a googol of transfinite plateaus.