At the poetry reading the young man scrolls his phone for 
suitable material, he hadn’t been to sleep since Wednesday,
executive function is suffering, 

the overnight shift at the TJ Maxx distribution center 
an assault on the circadian rhythm of a creature not 
nocturnal by nature, 

thirty-two on his last birthday, the all-nighters of disaffected 
youth a hazard now to health but the demands of the world 
are what they are, 

he stops on a short verse and reads words into the microphone 
too fast for anyone to absorb them, words as torrent,
words as flash-flood, 

he writes his poems in his head as he sorts and tags by night, 
thumbing remembered lines into his phone at the end of 
each shift, dawn breaking,

a stop at the Donut Bank on the way home, long hours of 
daylight an upside-down respite, it won’t always be like this, 
it’s just how it is now, 

and someday it will be different, he knows this because he is
thirty-two now and things are different, he has learned
to be grateful

for his thumbs and for the bag of donuts on the seat beside him 
and for the microphone and for the people in the room 
who listen like they mean it.