Because This Is Not a Novel

You do not get to be the protagonist.

Drop that. Frame yourself as a figure

in the background, shadowed.

Think side dish, accompaniment.

You are that friend, the one who disappears

after the biopsy results, the one

who says she’ll be there and isn’t.

Maybe you have broken someone’s heart.

It still hurts when they think of you.

You never even think of them.

Maybe that’s you buried in the basement,

an answer to someone else’s question.

Or you curled on the bed under

the pilly blue blanket

hoping he doesn’t come home drunk.

You are a character actor. You were in something,

but no one knows what.

Imagine a country

where the letters squirm

and the streets darken at night

while the air fills

with insect buzz and frog chirps.

A man sees you

standing alone on the street.

But do not forget

it’s not even about you then.

It’s about the man,

watching through the parted curtain,

his calloused hand on the lace.

He pauses just before

he drops it back and wonders

what you’re doing alone

so late at night.