Chris

Chris

I couldn’t tell you your own name, just someone else’s I stuck on you like a price sticker,

A similar model just rebranded.

I guess that’s always what you were in my mind.

An off-color.

But you, as everyone else, knew my name.

It took me three years to learn yours and three months to forget it.

Why were you so kind to me?

Did I stand out in your mind?

We will meet on the street and you will tell this story or something and I will say yes and

sorry and what was your name again?

Because I want to forget those years-

And you will be a proxy page in the book that I burn.

Those ashes will cling to my lungs and stay with me, withered and faint.

Black spots on pink flesh, you among them.

And I will pay homage to you, little black spot, with every breath.

My bellows, in and out.

Thank yous

by existing,

for existing

next to me