At Odds & Loose Ends: A poetry Collection

Depression Memes

He embraced the stirring waters

at the summit of flushed cheeks

In spite of rattlesnake sighs and gravel

that had been kicked too far from the road

Desert palms made short work

of lingering anguish

They were impatient with it by now

"It's nothing," he told them, "really."

Others nodded in relief and that would

be the end of it

On cold, crow-call mornings,

he cursed the numbers in his phone

and the room would collapse around him

I'm sure he thought it would be simple math

heaps of unread books,

stale napping and

sore daydreaming

"This isn't living."

The freckles became dust over blotchy skin,

falling apart at chapped edges

shallow well-wishes from faceless strangers

neglected promises and made his act

objectively worse