Friday, April 19, 2019

11,700. I CAN PRETEND

I CAN PRETEND
I can pretend I have nothing;
I can pretend I have you. Nether
one is truthful, neither one will do.
So I guess I'll sit here playing
solitaire with someone else's TV 
blaring in; counting cards, while
thinking of the stairway, and the
fire escape, and this whole damned
street of sin. There's no real logic
to my manifest, but I can pretend.
It's far easier to do : there's a man
with his wine bottle out front of this
place, I guess he'll be sleeping the
overnight again. A thin pile of old
blankets and some hand-held weird
contrivance he claims for his values.
Values? Claims? Him? I wouldn't 
even begin to know how to be 
living like that again. I'm too old 
now,  and soiled from death and 
destruction. I can pretend things 
are better, but  it's the only thing 
left I can do.

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