by Kashawn Taylor
In this big house
alone in my own room
I hear from downstairs
fourteen strange men loafed
on couches enraptured
by guys in tights
running back and forth across
a manicured field on this day of Thanks
hooting laughing shooting
the shit
It could be worse
Shit, it has been worse
much much worse
than babysitters in an office
under my room
than asking permission to leave
penning passes for those trips
walking to and from work
under New England sun /
through New England cold
I could be back in that dorm
with a hundred strange men
crying over dumb boys
for whom I am just an experiment
in happy-ending sleepovers
that dorm where I spilled
my guts while everyone slept
& couldn’t trim my waist
that dorm where I all I had
were fifteen minutes to prove
how much I loved someone
while spies absorbed every word
like pitifulness served on platters
& sure I could join them
traipse down the stairs
to (very fitting) calls
He’s left his cave
They don’t know I wish
to be flipping burgers & repeating
orders with the only friends I claim
to flirt out of one window
into another with strange men /
women whom I’ll never see again
(& I’ll never tell)
But it could be worse / shit
it has been worse
Does this still count
as being alone
?