Man to my right.
He’s round, he’s plain.
He’s autistic? Or his brain
has been stunted from
lack of stimulation. He speaks
loud and s-l-o-w-l-y.
———
He’s lonely. I can tell.
His days blend together, in need of
something distinguishable.
something edifying,
interesting,
enlightening,
inspiring…
“I used to go to church when I was a kid”
he says…. “but now I only go for the AA meetings.”
As I furtively listen, his life unfolds to my ears
poetic injustice makes itself known
Home is a box with no holes, a container with a plastic lid, a cell in which he
cannot seem to find the key
Where he can stay up as long as he likes
(the nights are endless)
Chatting it up with Jay Leno, who’s audience loved him so much
They offered to buy him another drink.
“But I like Good Morning America… Channel 13.”
He only wakes up because Diane Sawyer is
the only female in his life
Otherwise his days meld together,
his body not knowing when to rise.
He meets people all the time, but he is lonely.
It’s in the way he says hello to a man with a dog.
It’s in the way he asks a man with a bag to “take a seat”
“Sorry…. gotta run. See you at the meeting?”
He used to go to sunday school.
I went to a Baptist church, he says…. But now
I only go for the meetings.