Walking through memories on paper

like an abandoned town

Smiles advertise misleading claims to be better, stronger, more durable

While a single bus rushes by

Carrying self-conscious chatter

To rigid exercises in rote memorization

Of dehumanizing data sets and the ways society wants us to be.

Overgrown fingers of weeds scratch my thighs with eager immaturity

That doesn’t know how to appreciate the garden it invades.

I stand amongst them

Gazing at the temple built on a foundation

Of uncertain promise and assumptions

About a future that breathes ragged, tearful gasps

as an infant left unattended:

Crying out for nurture,

For instinct to return to Humanity and raise it

To see the beauty in painful moments

To love against fearful moments.