This is a first draft without any edits (which may be obvious). Just wanted to get it out, now, as it is, and post it before I can get self-conscious about it.
comfort
black asphalt parking lot shimmers
in the afternoon heat, empty
except for a few cars scattered
in the far corners
Elliott Smith plays in my earphones,
his sad acoustic guitar
accenting the life-weariness
in his heroin-addled voice
so many nights a bottle in my hand
comforted me while Elliott tried
to confirm the Seattle rain's promise
that it never gets better
I remember those nights
as little more than a poem
I once read, vague words
and images of decay
now this desert sun, ever-present,
dissolves the self, melts everything
beneath its glow, blurs the lines
separating me from myself
I sit in the evening, sticky
and salty, never quite getting cool
enough, so I watch my breath,
and wander off the cushion
but the breath anchors me in now,
pulls me back to its rhythm,
a stillness that still feels strange
when hungry ghosts crave escape
my mind repeatedly tries to flee
and recalls a night I saw Elliott
play at the Crocodile Tavern,
he seemed so painfully shy
later that night in the bar,
I bought him a beer and thanked him
for his music, but I wish now
I had simply held his hand
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