find me on a Friday forgiven,
still guessing at this game
with a knife and a noose,
but unable to cut loose like them.
Mild mid-winter on the upper
west side of Manhattan,
making believe after Miami
in a spell of soup and something
else, I give and give up.
As always, they leave
and I am stuck holding the tab,
paying for the drinks and the drowning,
by contention, if only there were
more affecting days stretching.
Dead other and poet friends
find me crossing streets
without looking both ways
just to tempt fate
and see what kills me, too.