V: The Misfit

The Misfit
I have walked on crowded streets where no one lives,
hiding my face--
never knowing them, never touching them.
I do not belong to crowds,
even the empty ones.

The rope is coarse
on the gallows,
waiting for the sound of the floor
to drop away into the emptiness
that is my home.

I try so hard to be like others
that my arms ache
from reaching to them,
but they always come back
empty.

So I rest them
in a chair in an empty room,
closing my eyes to the silence,
and believing, in the dark,
that I am a friend to all
and a lover to many.