The shoe sags on the metal wire,

low-hanging fruit, tethered only to air, waiting.

Rain pours, slicking the cracked plastic soles,

a colder weight swinging, damp and deep.

Each drop a measure of crushing futility,

a memory, slack and sinking in water.

I don’t just feel the cold;

I am the cold.

It seeps into the pavement,

whispers between the people passing.

The sound is no different:

the water'...

Where Do I Land?

The city hums

a low, relentless buzzing

laced with the stench of human urinals,

the beat of angry cars

nearly colliding,

crashing like tidal waves

if not for fate

intervening at the very last second,

amused by its own timing.

High above it all, I wait

a lone wolf,

while my pack builds the world without me,

dictating who I should become

to belong in it.

They whisper

inequality,

...