A coffee swells in waxy skin
The city squints through windowed glare
She’s creased inside a wrinkled dress
Her shape hangs limp in laundered air

A payphone rang, one ghost, one ring.
No one moved. We all just knew.
A siren dragged its echo past,
delivering a distant queue.

Fluorescent hums a migraned god.
My coat spins slow behind the glass,
zipper beats like trapped bird wing.
A sock grins dumb from wire racks.

This street is lined with yellow stain,
lights too bright for folks this small.
I sipped, I burned, I thought her name,
it drifted in suburban sprawl.

She’s someone else’s Sunday now
in fresh-washed light, her hair tucked neat.
Vanilla steam and honeyed bread
laughing soft in kitchen's heat.

The dryer stops. A broken chime.
Just silence, stretching like a neck.
I crack, not loud. Just wide enough
to feel the break beneath my breath.

Here my soles are worn too thin
A half-full cup, a sleepless eye,
no grace, no hand to lift away,
this curb, this ache, this grayer sky.