A moment or so

I could stand there and

smoke, or just stare up at

the sky. I could think of

my old friends back home

drinking at the same

old bars.

Or the married

ones captured between a

baby’s cry and a mortgage.

I could plot my future,

like I’ve done so many

times, knowing it’d

be revised on another

sleepless night.

What I’m saying

in this early hour is

that I could do

anything

the dawn being

full of endless potential.

But I was tired. After

a moment or so

I rubbed the stare

from my eyes. I

lost my concentration.

I wanted to walk

home, but found I

couldn’t. It was as

if my feet were stuck

to that piece of concrete

I was standing on.

So I stayed stuck. I

lit another cigarette while

I watched the clouds

some more. And then

a plane flying in front

of the clouds thousands

of feet above

my head and imagined

a man or woman looking

out a window and somehow

seeing me standing there

the cherry from my cigarette

dimming and brightening

with each exhale and inhale.

A single human being

they will never know or

see again.