After her sons suicide
they tore the damn bridge down
if you wanted across the water now
you had to go around

there’s a small plaque in his memory
near the water by the ridge
it says: for the way the world treated him
we thought we’d blame the bridge

I didn’t know him very well
I’m not qualified to speculate
reasons one thing, we all have reasons
they serve as license to complicate

our lives which mostly aren’t our own
this town which few still call home
he’s gone and life goes on
at least for some


You write about the working class
you sing the songs they cannot sing
another year on that tenure track
well, you do your thing, they’ll do their thing

and if the working class is a little bit fascist
still, after all these years of Marxism
you’ll put it in a footnote because
really, who are you to judge them

And you didn’t know him very well
you’re not qualified to speculate
reasons one thing, we all have reasons
they serve as license to complicate

our lives which mostly aren’t our own
this town which few still call home
he’s gone and life goes on
at least for some


The whole town was at the funeral
I’m heading off to grad school next year
you wrote me a nice letter of recommendation
and we both shed the exact same fake tear

there were a few of his old poems in the newspaper
further evidence of his unhappiness
and we all forgave him for his trespass
against the holly ghost of consumer bliss

The town didn’t know him very well
no one’s qualified to speculate
reasons one thing, we all have reasons
they serve as license to complicate

our lives which mostly aren’t our own
this town which few still call home
he’s gone and life goes on
at least for some