Birthday

Because of the months lost to silence

The afterparty hours of dusty guitars and mumbled

Cover versions, towels hanging damp on doors

Because of tiny injuries that grew into suddenly the only thing ever talked about

Empty shampoo bottles with necks wrung dry

Because of the little lives that happened only when two people laughed in the same room

Because every object held led to half a day of tears screaming into the carpet

Nostalgia for a time that is still ending and a place that is still containing all

Because of the certainty that this pile of shoes will live on to be a pile of shoes in another house

Because loneliness is just the uncertain feeling as a self fills a room, a garden, a city without apology

Because weeds stop being weeds once their purpose is remembered

Because the self exists in others through lived recognition

The music heard through someone else’s wall.

Because it is the unlikely nature of life to start as a sandcastle and be blown away until it lands in everyone’s chips but our own

We spend the years in-between pushing toes into the beach upside down at night

Because it’s all going to happen anyway

Washing needs to dry and toothpaste-mirror must be wiped,

And time’s nails continue to grow

Because the flatscreen is on with no one in the room and the candle has charred its own wax like hope