Nearly thirty, gut hanging out of a shirt

once large enough to sleep in;

I lie on my back because my side

is too heavy for the limp shoulder, arm

beginning to pop under such weight,

on the couch listening to men

who pretend they care

about a working class receding

to the janitor's closet of a school

scratching for paper and pencils,

let alone books printed

in this century.

We are the new cool,

smoking discarded cigarettes

(still burning)

foraging dumpsters flowing with last weeks

fresh produce, competing with employees

and the retired elderly. Apologies

for our newly found barbarism; we've been

quite the circus animal, but none of us

have pitched the tent.

This morning, I gave a bird some crumbs,

not knowing if it was a finch, heron, crow,

even though the difference is quite easy to tell;

my heart has been bleeding for the first time

in some years, even though

I've never had less.