He Goes

he collects unlived moments in clear jars with tight lids and no labels he has baggage he will never unpack on the floor of every closet dark and silent like moss He waits for the neighbor to bring him leftovers - She cooks like the mother he never had and the wife he'll never want he wonders why the nights bleed to day and this year has bled him dry his goal is distant, dim and bitter but the here is pain and the now regret and the past is notwithstanding he wishes he could hope while he hoped to have wishes but he feels no gray between the black and white in each movement forward there is backward motion and progress is measured by the love avoided he looks everywhere but does not see what he cannot stop from breathing in “that” which fills his lungs and soul he longs for something he can not tolerate desires something that burns him from the inside tries to hold the very thing his heart rejects as each unmarked memory and every unfelt touch haunts him like unpaid bills he moves through the muck in weighted hip high self-righteousness he goes because he cannot stop he breaths because he cannot cry and he accepts that he cannot feel