PASSING BY

passing by
I pass by your window, friend
and hear you inside
with the others
laughing and talking
cheering
celebrating
for many years I’ve wondered
what it was all about
what it was that you were talking about
laughing and cheering and celebrating
but I know now
that you do not know
that your thoughts are like maimed animals
limping around the forest
of your mind
simple and humble things
struggling to stay alive
and they
like you
do not know, either
but still I wonder
and this wondering is obnoxious to me
like being nagged by your mother
to do the dishes
vacuum the floor
and take out the trash
you just want to turn and roar,
“enough! SHUT UP already!
the dishes and the floor and the trash,
they don’t matter a fuck!”
but rather than answers
I would give up the questions
in the space of a vole’s heartbeat
I would do this
and it would be something done so genuinely
with so much determination
that I would never have any regret
never again a thought about why
when I pass your window
why you are in there
talking and laughing
and celebrating
instead
I would stop in front of your door
and put my hand on the doorknob
I would turn it
without knocking
and walk right in