for kirby.

I am afraid of what I will write.

I read of nights and fights of ageless youth.

And fall asleep inside a drug that maps a web of fires.

Children blowing away, but they are not afraid.

A public restroom teeming with the filth of the faceless.

I see old friends, toothless from drug addiction, climbing a snowy hill in May,

Slipping inch by inch further and further away, but they are not afraid.

Gravesites littered with mementos left by lovers and friends.

A girl sitting cross-legged, in an instant she will leap to her feet to perform. She is not afraid.

Driveway.

A three-year-old boy digs for treasure, a future walking stick upright and airtight and he is not afraid.

I am broken in a room of educational puppet monkeys, stroking their egos and counting their freckles in a competition to win nothing. And I am not afraid.