If you think it will stop
Don’t
Hold on to the railing
Jump
Over the edge
Onto the sidewalk
Separated from streets
Marauding, rubber tires pummel
Surveying alleyways neglected and
Trash cans brimming with disregard
It’s lonely here, as if each pebble were a
Reveler
Ambivalent toward you
Unkempt and stiff
As if petrified and disavowed at once
Ignored, timid
Apathetic discharge
Free,
Fallen
From a short, raised canopy
Of steel
And wood and
Bones and
Dust
Chalk; dried on a lesson
Conveyed
Battalions, battalions
Marching
Avid miscreants
Scurrying
The masters couldn’t paint as fast
And each trifling matter
Marches past with
Battalions
Battalions
Battalions
And Stones