Each time I come home a little something
erodes, a smooth stone rubbed against cement
for a few hours. Walking into Zub’s,
into Ray’s– used to be the crowd could be
religious for me. A thunderspark, my ego
self-distributed communion. Yes, I want
a sea of friends to greet me when I go
home, forever the place I must be
magnetized to, being the treadmill I ran
up to a certain age. I aged better than I
thought, but I aged, I. aged, T. aged, T. aged,
A. aged, M. aged, R. aged, W. aged– and live
in other cities now. The jobs and kids, the
wanting them– I acknowledge the finally
shifting tectonics beneath my feet I so long denied.
I stand at an empty table with everything extinct,
drinking Christmas Ale in the light of flickering
football fields. I play 20 Questions with myself
imagining what my friends might ask me.
Am I alive? A mineral? Furniture? Ovate,
made of fur, smaller than a bread box?
Am I a utility? Can I eat myself?

Do you call when it’s not convenient?
When you are not around?
                                                       When?

Are you an animal? Malleable? Leather?
                                                       A vegetable?

Are you something a bird might wear? A feather,
                                                       weightless as the wind?

(originally published in Marias & Sampaguitas, Summer 2021)