His Yellow Hoodie Poem by Glen Zerrudo

dusk folds,6: 45 pm
light quits.
laundry trembles on the wire-
blue / red / black
(people who grew up with softness) .
and then--

me.
the yellow hoodie.
backward.
sour with childhood.
a smell like sleeping on floors.
a smell like no one came home.
fabric flinches away.
the wind refuses to touch me.

I ruin the row just by hanging.
the tree listens, bored.
the coffee cup,
crushed-
smiles at the clean ones.
they get applause.
I get avoidance.

what story do I carry?
tears that never dried
sweat that never belonged to play
blood that never shocked anyone
because suffering was expected.

my pockets
full of trash
full of relics I pretended were magic
so the emptiness had a name.

'too much, ' they whisper.
'too heavy, '
as if gravity was my fault.
as if belonging was something earned
by being easy to hold.

the hoodie says.
quietly,
one day the boy might pull
his own drawstring tight
to stop being an interruption
in other people's comfort.

tongs pinch me..
as if pain is contagious.
they fling me into the wind.

I spin
brief freedom-
then fall.
water waits.

dark pool.
no moon.

I drop in,
thinking
clean, cleanse, clean,

but no..
I slide straight into the drain.
metal teeth.
rust kisses fabric.

stuck.
again.
still.

a drowning
even water cannot wash.