sometimes when I think back
to my fuck ups or falling down,
I come here and I see all these
women and I think,
whose answered prayer am I?
she said
and that struck me.
when women speak
I put my head down deferentially
go back to past
but also out of my own
need to curl up
inside myself.
It’s winter, 2015,
just past the new year,
I’m broken hearted
and knee deep in
some fucking secrets
but whose answered prayer
am I? who called
the wounded shepard
here? It’s 2015 and I had
just been gifted three thousand
dollars from my grandmother
that my parents called and asked
for back.

I gave them two thousand and
used the  rest to move out of
the townhouse
into a one bedroom
in the heart of Kensington.
embraced by the “Auspicious
Coin Laundry” service next door.
no one would ever miss my house.
I didn’t have anything left
over but I never did.
it’s worth mentioning that when I was
eighteen and just home for
the summer from college,
my mother told me they had
cleaned out my savings account.

“family”