i spent the afternoon listening to indie folk songs,
and played a drinking game where every time
the singer, with a mid-western accent,
sung about staring into the abyss,
then i’d take a swig of my stella artois,
which got me stone drunk, and laughing
on my ass
i don’t have the right sort of nerve,
damage,
to kiss myself, but i thought i could
still revel in a captured galaxy
buzzing around in an unclean mason jar,
shook around like a snow globe
glistening in a twilight abyss
i made a mistake and
tried to hold my breath
when the climate changed,
in hopes that i might adapt
to what was to come, but could not be seen,
though i didn’t realize my adaptation
had already been done before
Fred Aiken Writing 