Anyone's Ghost

by August Thompson

I came here on a Klonopin-warm flight to witness their grief and understand how it matches my own.

perfect place to discover the new shapes that come out of familiar songs after one has smoked enough pot.

We smoked more and talked more and ate more and watched the sun die for the day.

I was a lifetime from the very beginning of being who I wanted.

I thought about how change brews for months, maybe years, then arrives in a moment.

Always, I tried to find places I could discreetly enjoy the lives of others.

the gap between the boy I felt I should be and the one I wanted to be was too wide.

I’d always hated birthdays. For someone who spent his life lonely, I didn’t like days that were about me. Not because the attention was too much, but because it was, invariably, too little.

It felt earned—like maybe you had to get hurt by someone before you learned how to love them.