Go Down Loving

Soon I am going to leave you.

And when I’m gone, there are things

I want you to remember.

First, I want you to know that there are reasons,

Reasons that I worked till 11 on school nights,

Only to come home to a dark house

And stare at pictures of men I could never become.

Second, I want you to know

That the effeminate boy who whispered during Latin

Wasn’t gay. He was only

Scared of holding onto the world too firmly,

Scared to call his life his own.

And thirdly,

I want you to know that he loved you

As much as a boy could love anyone.

But he was afraid to express it,

For fear that his words would drown out the sky.

Because here is the truth:

If you want to make a man uncomfortable,

Look him in the eye.

You’ll see the horizon there

As I have many times before:

Lit on fire by the sunset,

Burning on the fuel of a hundred trivial tomorrows.