Originally published on August 26, 2010 on the now-defunct Best American Poetry blog. Republished in The Trouble Clef.
WHAT CAN KILL YOU
No,
indifference
is not
the worst of it,
and it doesn’t equate
with loneliness.
After all
you choose
your feelings,
even though
it doesn’t seem
like a choice.
No, it’s not
your sloppy sense
of direction,
alienating attitudes
or unbearable shyness,
which is, in fact,
bearable,
it is something else
entirely,
like cancer or
a car crash and
it is somewhere else
where you lost it,
your crumbling sense
of perspective.
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