You are an embarrassment

he said while picking my pockets

vacant I stared idle

in an undisclosed location

Danielle sat next to me

tenderly stroking the inside flesh

of my arm although

we’d only spoken a handful of times

back in grade school, he said again

Nobody likes you, you know

So I just agreed with him because

her fingers felt like grasshopper wings

fluttering through my mind, he

looked a deep sorrow longer

and that’s where he began to cry

I am sorry my friend, I said while he

cradled me like a new born lamb

only I was much bigger than him

so by the end of it it was I who was

more so doing the cradling, then

as he disappeared effortlessly

Danielle and I sat a long while

next to one another, her hair

long dark and full of whispers

while the room filled with necessary strangers

Holding hands for a while she said,

you aren’t that bad you know

he just really loves you is the point

and then too disappeared into a sea of snakes

which I could not swim

while the couch turned to an island

I sat sipping from my cup

the bitter dark liquid I had earlier poured.