Wasted ABQ Summer

You used to be the embodiment of the color yellow—radiant—warm—obnoxious to some/ But now—after all these years—you seem to be a glacial blue / Polite—but not as gregarious / This is what you told me / Perhaps I realized not everyone is a friend—I said / And then I asked / But isn’t my life getting better? / Surely my depression is over / Then you replied / I never said you were depressed / You are not depressed / You are sad / There is a difference / What is the difference? I asked / Sadness doesn’t attempt to detach from the gestalt of life / You still embrace and attempt to shape your lot in life / But you are sad / One of the saddest girls I’ve ever seen / But surely I’m thawing out—I contend / Yes—but at a glacial pace—you reiterated / This is a small town—you continued / Everyone knows each other—and my advice / TRY TO BE SWITZERLAND / Or at least Croatia / None of these people know me—I said / I’m new to town / And they know it—you said / You don’t dress like them or talk like them / And news spreads / So what—I asked / They read your stuff—remember—you reminded me / So I’m melting—I respond / Wait—how do you know I’m sad? I asked / Because of your cadence—and the problems you bring up constantly in conversation / Some permutation of the same problem / Does he care about me? / Will he call me back? / Will I have a family? / Will I be middle class? / These are all the problems you bring up / I respond—well—he doesn’t care about me / No—he doesn’t care / He fucks me—but doesn’t respect me / Maybe shreds of kindness—paternalism—or generosity / Out of pity perhaps / But admiration or profound attachment? Not really / Just give it some time—you said / There’s no one there / And it’s lonely / And one day it won’t be lonely / It will just be solitude / And one day this solitude will swallow me whole / And I’m a big ice cube / In a sweltering hot parking lot / And the asphalt chokes me up / In its blackness—and I won’t be blue anymore / I’ll be clear / Completely mollified by work / Living a bare life / In a parking lot / And there’s nothing in the cube to discover / No cavewoman / Not even fossilized shit / I’ll turn into a puddle / And maybe the puddle will contain rainbows / Due to the slick substrate of circumstance / Reacting with my liquified essence / But I’ll vaporize / And then I’ll be gone.