I’m glad I was there,
Touching the hem of garments
Of those who went on to be Of Note,
Close but never quite enough to be
Perceived.
Perceived.
That word, spine tingling
In the way it calls to mind
Middle school PE and
Being last place.
The worst, basically.
*
The new place has its
Bedrooms downstairs.
It’s cheap and I thought
This would be fine.
The old tenants were also
A single mom and a daughter.
She was there, the daughter,
When we toured it and
Offered mine an Easter chocolate.
A gesture that would later be
Gleefully recounted to many.
“A sign,” I would think.
But it’s cavelike and I am
Cavelike already.
Closed and hunched and hiding.
A little too on the nose, really,
For me to be sleeping in there.
I get up every day and emerge
From the cave, mostly reluctantly,
And it’s symbolism.
“Did they also feel this way?,”
I sometimes wonder.
*
Before all of this, though,
I was there.
With a level of involvement
Just shy of commitment.
Phasing in and out like
An inter-dimensional being.
Maybe you glimpsed a flash
Of light and shadow
Before you became Of Note.
Remember that time you saw it?
It was me.