BLCKDGRD

United Stated

This season's
(and next year's)

United obituary

at the new place.

Thanks to everyone who's moved their bookmarks, blogrolls, and readers. Please tag along the rest of you.

United 2, Toronto 3

Hey Man, game post is over at the NEW PLACE. Thanks if you've already moved your bookmarks, blogrolls, and eyes over there, thanks in advance in hopes that you do if you haven't.

Did You Know Washington DC Has a Professional Soccer Team?

On Moreno's last game.

For those of you who read me for soccer only - who hate the politics, hate the other stuff - and who've bookmarked or blogrolled or readered me at the DCU category level, I've moved HERE and set up a label DCU so you can do the same there.

Long story short: typepad can't do what blogger does re: make blogging easier for me. I'm selfish this way. Thanks in advance for tagging along.

Lucky for Us They Don't Know What They're Doing, These Puny Anonymous Creatures of Dark and Damp Who Eat Simply to Live, with No More Sense of Mission Than Nature Feels in Providing for Our Survival

Alright, I think I've successfully blogrolled everyone at THE NEW PLACE who is still alive and who was on the blogroll at the this old place. If you don't see yourself at THE NEW PLACE in the right-hand column under BECAUSE you're in the left-hand column BECAUSE because it makes things easier from a me organizational point-of-view. If you are on the old blogrolls but don't see yourself on the blogrolls at THE NEW PLACE, please send me an email (blckdgrd ampersand gmail dot com), or if you are being Kind to me and I'm not reciprocating, and/or you want to Hey Sailor me, send an email too.

I realize that moving to THE NEW PLACE at a time when I'm getting more hits than ever smacks of self-destructive stupidity, but getting angry at motherfucking typepad was motherfucking unfun and I can find unfun by the motherfucking bucketful without motherfucking typepad's help, and the look there is better and Ba'al bless the updating blogrolls, they're both boon to you bloggers I pimp and a lazy man's dream.

I recognize the inconvenience. Sincere and flattered thanks to friends who've already rewired their bumps to THE NEW PLACE, advance thanks to everyone who will move their bumps and eyes to THE NEW PLACE too.

Links and music will be posted here for at least another week (though not updates and link updates in posts), though no promises.

UPDATE! Though to be a pest, if you want to hear the new Fever Ray cover of Gabriel's Mercy Street that I literally just heard for the first time, go here.

• The law is an ass... armed with rockets.
• Imperial collapse. What if Obama is was a progressive and this is the honest best he could do?
• Daily obamapostasy.
• Obama's achievement.
• Yup.
• Streaking.
• Pig self-righteously (and correctly) calls hypocrisy on Democrats. 
• Bought and sold. 
• Cult indoctrination.
• And no one's mind was changed.
• Not Elric, not Ehrlich, Elrich.
• More on Carla Cohen once, twice. 
• Go on, get a United shirt tattoo.
• Debating MFAs.
• On C, part three.
• Left of the dial.
• Bohemian Rhapsody flow-chart. 
• Wahwah. Just spend the long weekend with All Things Must Pass.
• Awaiting on you all.
• What a great album. Let it roll.

But not the poem, because motherfucking typepad fucks up the line-breaks every goddamn time, and I don't need the arrgh to deal with it. The poem from which the post's title is taken is at THE NEW PLACE.

Another one of dozens of my five favorite songs ever:

Volitionless, from Different Heights, and in the One Direction

Well, here's yesterday's obamapostasy. Today's Columbus Day, so it might not be until tomorrow Obama scolds me for my shallow fealty and selfishness, my blindness at his obamawesomeness, my traitorously irresponsible threats to not vote this cycle.

Speaking of threats: It's happening (go on, look), but it's still in the very early exploratory stage. I haven't yet discovered all the ways blooger sucks, but tell me, old bloogers, is there a way to set links so they open in a new window? That's one thing typepad does that, as far as I can tell, blooger doesn't. That's not a deal-breaker, and I love the self-updating blogrolls (and if I move I'll be pinging some of you less - though reading new content, of course - because I've been using your self-updating blogrolls as a shortcut) (though the work and aargh of creating those blogrolls, both as a conscientious effort of Kind and as pain-in-the-ass time-wise is both mighty incentive and, subsequently, mighty disincentive). I like I can make photos and youtubes bigger and need break long lines in poems less often. I love that if I can find the poem I'm looking for online (so I don't have to type it) it formats in blooger with none of the grief formatting in typepad causes. I dig the url.

I haven't written about tablets here in a while which by no means means I've stopped writing about tablets. I'm a rube for a new tablet, as if it will make better what I scribble in it. I don't think I've ever gone as long between reformating BLCKDGRD's appearance since I switched to this template three years at least ago. Typepad doesn't allow archiving in an old formats when switching to a new format - if I widened the middle column every Fleabus photo fit for the old format will be too small, line breaks in poems will be fucked. I worry about shit like this. But mostly I'm bored and I have a new tablet.

I'll will cross-post both places for at least a couple of months, but if you're inclined to be Kind, those of you who've blogrolled me, bookmarked me, subscribed to me, I apologize for the inconvenience and thank you in advance for your taking the trouble to move with me.

• Radical pessimist's view of the next ten years.
• See, here's the thing: if Obama had been doing this a year ago instead of a month before an election it wouldn't look like a bullshit election pose.
• Whores, sluts, cunts, bitches.
• I knew this would produce this would produce this.
• Glossy Karl.
• The man with no name.
• Krugman's obamapostasy, stage one.
• Rahmoron.
• I am shocked to learn that Politico has a political agenda.
• What's the difference between Linda McMahon and Larry Flint?
• How to think about Lou Dobbs.
• ICC from the sky.
• Good spot for a soccer stadium.
• I have never been able to finish a Peter Carey novel, though I stopped trying long ago.
• On poetry anthologies. I love American Hybrid.
• Sad news. Good bookstore.
• Coetzee reviews latest Roth.
• What you can buy me for Giftmas.
• What's wrong with this picture?
• Nothing to get pissy about.
• Bad moon rising.

PORCELAIN

Carl Phillips

As when a long forgetfulness lifts suddenly, and what
we'd forgotten—as we look at it squarely, then again
refuse to look—is our own
                                            inconsequence, yes, it was
mostly like that, sex as both an act of defacement and—
as if the two were the same thing—votive offering,
insofar as the leaves
                                     also were a kind of offering, or could
at least be said to be, as they kept falling the way leaves
do: volitionless, from different heights, and in the one direction.

Elric moved his stuff out of our basement yesterday and I found three CD racks I hadn't seen the four years and remembered a bunch of bands I hadn't thought of in a while, like this one:

United 0, San Jose 2

The Moreno/McDonald incident that led to the red cards in the 8th minute was off-ball, so I didn't see it, and you know who else didn't see it? Alex Prus, the referee, who, after consulting with a side-line ref who was at least 40 yards from the incident, red-carded both players. Maybe the players deserved it - TV replays only show the elbow to Jaime's head - but the bigger question is why would MLS assign Alex Prus to a DCU game just two weeks after Alex Prus shit the bed at RFK?

The man in the middle was referee Alex Prus, who, just two weeks ago, tossed both coaches during the United-Houston Dynamo match at RFK Stadium. United officials were baffled as to why Prus was working another one of their games so soon. On a side note, after tonight's match, Prus hosted a previously scheduled seminar upstairs at RFK for, I believe, local fans and refs.

What a motherfucking rinkydink league.

Not that it mattered. United was never going to score, San Jose was going to score eventually  - the most interesting aspect of the TV replay is listening to the contempt The Bowtie, who usually is such a fucking homer, had for both United's offense and defense. (Maybe it was because Dave Johnson, who is a bigger homer than The Bowtie, wasn't on the call and The Bowtie felt liberated.) Listen to The Bowtie scold Graye for Wondolowski's first goal, scold the entire defense for Wondolowski's second goal, listen to Tony Linarzi and The Bowtie berate Pablo Hernandez for dancing in the box rather than take an open shot - I'm told to STFU about Hernandez until he's surrounded by better players and can be fairly accessed, and I like his motor, I like his first touch, but shoot the fucking ball.

And Troy Perkins, who had no chance on the first San Jose goal but was fully responsible for the second, thank you, you were the only United player who as much as clapped at LOUD SIDE! after the game, who actually walked over and into the crowd. United sucks - and I mean SUCKS! - and we're still there. Which makes them ingrates, which makes us rubes.

As Long as the Fish Are Female Saleswomen in Tropical Fish Stores Are Allowed to Go Topless

So I log onto motherfucking typepad this morning and there's a new editing platform and it sucks unto blow and blows unto suck. Compare the space between the above Fleabus photo and the text of this post with the space between the Fleabus photo and text in this post. An eighth of an inch of motherfucking aargh, and there's no fucking fixing it.

Motherfucking typepad has always sucked, dropping colors, dropping fonts, dropping links, dropping margins, dropping formatting, eating text, eating posts, and now it sucks more with a motherfucking upgraded editor? I'm paying $150 a year for this motherfucking suck? Fuckity, I can get all the motherfucking suck I want in this world for free (though if we want the 5% discount on next year's United season tickets we need to get it in by November, though I'm buying that motherfucking suck one way or the other).

Well, this is the last year I'm paying motherfucking typepad for the suck unless it's not. If I migrate I'll migrate slowly (I have eleven months of paid-for suck remaining), and once I figure out and format Blooger (which I'm told is still suckful though far less suckful than when it pissed me off in 2006, plus it has those cool self-updating blogrolls) or Wordpress, I'll cross-post both here and there for the first couple of months as I hassle you to update your bookmarks and blogrolls, though, knowing me, I'll probably spare you and me and just stay here and pay for and eat and spit my aargh for my daily aargh.

• Notice how the above is properly spaced from the text but is slightly off-center. Motherfucking typepad allows me one or the other. Oh, and they have no live-chat or phone help.
• Your country: operating procedures.
• Alternatives?
• World's Shittiest Human wetfarts, giggles.
• This guy is mighty shitty himself. (h/t)
• Spending priorities.
• On the Nobel in medicine.
• Shocking sensible.
• Duke winces! 
• Wordpress v Blooger? Thoughts?
• Purple Line, O'Malley, Ehrlich.
• Fuck Old Angler's Inn, which I've driven by literally hundreds, if not thousands of times, and never eaten once.
• Dredging Needwood.
• BLCKDGRD translated into Greek by someone in Athens googling images of eformeday eoplepay.
• You do know blogging is a metaphor for everything, yes?
• I never got the fuss over Ted Hughes' poetry.
• Pigs are pleased Vargas Llosa won Nobel.
• Albini v Sonic Youth, con't.
• Red Arc/Blue Veil.

LAWLESS PANTOUM

Denise Duhamel

Men are legally allowed to have sex with animals,
as long as the animals are female.
Having sexual relations with a male animal
is taboo and punishable by death.

As long as the fish are female
saleswomen in tropical fish stores are allowed to go topless.
Adultery is punishable by death
as long as the betrayed woman uses her bare hands to kill 
    her husband.

Saleswomen in tropical fish stores are allowed to go topless,
but the gynecologist must only look at a woman’s genitals 
    in a mirror.
The woman uses her bare hands to kill her husband,
then his dead genitals must be covered with a brick.   

The gynecologist must only look at a woman’s genitals 
    in a mirror
and never look at the genitals of a corpse—
these genitals must be covered with a brick.
The penalty for masturbation is decapitation.

A look at the genitals of a corpse
will confirm that not much happens in that region after death.
The penalty for masturbation is decapitation.
It is illegal to have sex with a mother and her daughter at 
    the same time.

To confirm what happens during sex,
a woman’s mother must be in the room to witness her daughter’s 
    deflowering,
though it is illegal to have sex with a mother and her daughter 
    at the same time.
It is legal to sell condoms from vending machines as long as

a woman’s mother is in the room to witness her daughter’s 
    deflowering.
Men are legally allowed to have sex with animals—
why it’s even legal to sell condoms from vending machines, 
    as long as
everyone’s having sexual relations with a male animal.

The number 41 greatest music act according to KEXP's silly-ass fund-drive gimmick list happens to have made another one of dozens of my five favorite songs ever:

As Always, Neglecting to Drown

On my neighborhood's listserv:

Dan is going to put Charlie to sleep if I cant find him a home. DOES ANYONE HAVE ANY IDEAS?? Please write or call whomever you can that might be able to help -- Charlie's days are numbered. his new family -- with two small kids -- dont like charlie and charlie doesnt like them. the kids are too young and loud noises and loud commotion bother him.

I would take him but he doesnt like me. He wont come out of his kennel when around me. AND He hates my neighbors and their kids so they cant help me walk him when I am not home. so I dont know what to do.

Anyway -- let me know ASAP if you can think of an idea yourself. this dog has major mental problems from being negected and abused by his last house. But, with training, he might be able to be socialized. I found a trainer that would take him in but it would cost approx $1200 a month. he is used to living around other dogs, cats and parrots.

Ideas? Anyone has Ideas?

Yes, no-kill rescues, and I sent her links. And fuck motherfucking puppy mills and the motherfucking crackers that support them because they hate the Humane Society.

An acquaintance told me he and his wife have found a new apartment, one where they can have pets, they're getting a purebred terrier and a bluepoint cat from reputable breeders, and no, I didn't ask had they considered rescues because what would asking have served beyond satisfying the scold in me.

Whoa, on Obama's mendacity of hope:

I’m not sure Gibbs has a coherent idea of what he means by the “left,” but if opposition to permanent war, extrajudicial assassination of American citizens, boundless state secrecy, and unlimited corporate bailouts constitutes “leftism,” then so be it. True to their Clintonian principles, President Obama and his advisors have spurned the Democratic Party’s liberal base and have sought to govern by appropriating the policies of the Republican right. Just as Bill Clinton enacted NAFTA and destroyed welfare, Barack Obama has pushed through a health-care program that was inspired by the Heritage Foundation and largely written by the insurance lobby—and he shows every sign of being willing to vandalize Social Security in the name of deficit reduction even though the program has nothing to do with the federal budget deficit. Obama has embraced the Bushite war on terror and has refused to roll back the unconstitutional executive usurpations that so outraged his supporters. And yet Democrats expect liberals to toe the line and shut the hell up lest the Republicans take advantage of their dissent. In fact, for the most part, the “professional left” of policy intellectuals, public interest advocates, and opinion journalists have done just that.

All good and fine, but then he adds:

What’s fascinating about the Democrats is how consistently they have squandered enormous political advantages. The party’s leaders have apparently internalized Republican propaganda to the point that they feel they do not deserve to rule; consequently, when Democrats come to power, they always negotiate with themselves prior to meeting their opponents, make the tough-minded decision to betray their most loyal supporters, and profess shock and anger when the GOP—which never makes the mistake of publicly spurning its base—refuses to accept the purported bipartisan compromise. What results, of course, is that the Democratic Party, over and over again, enacts some version of the Republican agenda.

And that sums up the rube I try but fail to finally shed, the rube who gets screamed at because I don't quite want to shed it enough, the rube who gets lectured to by my dearest mentors who remember when progress (defined in their case by the civil and labor rights won post-Depression) was not only demanded and expected but achievable, the happy, fat, and domesticated rube who likes to play at being feral.

• Napoleon is a wonder cat, Frankie the funniest cat I've know.
• Give to a rescue. Get your next pet from a rescue. Please.
• As the world burns.
• Bigot-whisperers.
• Republicans are shitty, and no amount of Democratic shittiness changes that essential truth.
• No fucking duh.
• Chasing Fox.
• UPDATE! The poverty of partisans.
• Comic genius of Yggie Wiggles.
• On the above.
• Behavioral conditioning.
• Perhaps Pastor Sanctimonious' most bullshit column ever.
• Blankfein blackmail.
• Economic subversions.
• Ireland is our future.
• Three balls, two strikes.
• Breakfast Club, part 6.
• Treehouse of Love.
• Oops.
• UPDATE! Debating Obama's mendacity.
• Obama unveils -.06% less-shitty argument.
• Daily obamapostasy.
• On the above.
• Pervasive.
• Joementum, 2010-style!
• UPDATE! This will happen if he's far enough behind in the polls in January 2012, and who knows, it might work.
• Howie Fucking Kurtz leaving Your Fucking Washington Post.
• Last week's news.
• National digital library?
• On college majors.
• Hey! thanks! for the Kind.
• If not Earthgirl's favorite artist, top three:

• Fat New Jersey pig to endorse Maryland pig.
• Gray appeals to whites!
• BRAC, or: My Future Hell.
• Clarksburg!
• Ambulance fees and repercussions.
• Slots.
• Hirshhorn redo.
• UPDATE! This? is awesome.

• Ngugi wa Thiong'o now odds-on-favorite to win Nobel. I read and liked a lot but promptly stopped thinking about Wizard of the Crow. (Cormac McCarthy is now second favorite.)
• C, con't.
• The greatest novelist the 1950s has to offer.
• UPDATE! Lawrence Durrell, who I hadn't thought about in years.
• Roth whines about technology. Roth is for the old.
• Obscure Sound's Best of September w/MP3.
• This week's new releases, w/MP3.
• It's Fall Drive week at KEXP. If you listen, throw them some tribute. This drive's gimmick? They asked listeners to vote for their top music acts, solo or band, ever. Who will be number one, Beatles, Radiohead or Arcade Fire?
• The messenger who shoots back: Albini v Sonic Youth.

SUCCESS COMES TO COW CREEK

James Tate

I sit on the tracks, 
a hundred feet from
earth, fifty from the
water. Gerald is
inching toward me
as grim, slow, and
determined as a
season, because he
has no trade and wants 
none. It's been nine months 
since I last listened 
to his fate, but I
know what he will say:
he's the fire hydrant
of the underdog.

When he reaches my
point above the creek,
he sits down without
salutation, and
spits profoundly out
past the edge, and peeks
for meaning in the
ripple it brings. He
scowls. He speaks: when you 
walk down any street 
you see nothing but
coagulations
of shit and vomit,
and I'm sick of it.
I suggest suicide;
he prefers murder, 
and spits again for 
the sake of all the 
great devout losers.

A conductor's horn 
concerto breaks the 
air, and we, two doomed 
pennies on the track, 
shove off and somersault 
like anesthetized 
fleas, ruffling the 
ideal locomotive 
poised on the water 
with our light, dry bodies. 
Gerald shouts 
terrifically as
he sails downstream like 
a young man with a 
destination. I 
swim toward shore as 
fast as my boots will 
allow; as always, 
neglecting to drown.

This was in my head yesterday afternoon as the 102 degree fever was crashing. counterstream has been playing a lot of contemporary choral music lately, so you are forewarned, though I've listened to Monk for years and this is one of dozens of my five favorite songs ever:

Colorado 0, United 1

United never won in Denver when they were good, go figure they win in Denver when they suck (and thank you for sucking in front of an open net, Drew Moor).

I'm ambivalent whether Saint Benny of Olsen should be given the head coaching job in full, but these half-talents bust their ass for him. Colorado's to blame that they assumed all they need to is show up to win, but United won the majority of 50-50s, acted like the team that wanted to win more, and that's to Benny's credit. Whether Benny is ready to coach a team of superior talent to championships is an open question - whether Benny is ready to develop a young team into superior talent is an open question - but this team works harder for him than they ever did for Tom Soehn or Curt Onalfo.

Najar is special, and he seems to know how to avoid taking shots; the only concern I hear about Najar is his size vis a vis standard MLS brutality. He was clearly, demonstrably, the best player on the field. Another bump-up for Quaranta, better but still so-so for Bošković, but Pablo Hernandez, oy: gacks a sitter in the 78th minute then dives and fakes an injury. Get up, chunker.

And O! Who knew Colorado was so fun to hate? I mean sure, fuck Pablo Mastroeni (I'm still angry about the stupid red card v Italy in WC06), and fuck Conor Casey, but adding fucking Jeff Larentowicz and fucking Wells Thompson? Fuck Colorado.

Three games left, two at home, next Saturday v San Jose then Chicago on the road (remember when a late season game v Chicago was big?) then finale a week later at RFK v Toronto. There's a chance United could catch Ningland or Chivas and not be the shittiest. Yay! Ambition!

Soon Your Dear Ones Will Hide in a Closet When They Hear Your Heavy Step on the Porch and Then Your House Will Slide into Disrepair

Dear Cowardly Emailer clever enough to send an email without return address (not that I'd have emailed you; I remark only on your cowardice),

Why yes, this blog does suck, thank you. I've always said so. I don't know what I want this crappy blog to be, funny or serious, happy or angry, light or heavy, conciliatory or accusatory, open-minded or parochial, honest or disingenuous, coherent or incoherent, rude or ruder, loud or louder, self-aggrandizing or self-scourging, informative or white noise, etc.... but I do know that I don't want this blog to be either funny or serious, happy or angry, light or heavy, coherent or incoherent, conciliatory or accusatory, open-minded or parochial, honest or disingenuous, rude or ruder, loud or louder, self-aggrandizing or self-scourging, informative or white noise, etc... 

These are the funniest, most serious, happiest, angriest, lightest, heaviest, most in need of conciliation, most necessarily accusatory, most open-minded, most parochial, most honest, most disingenuous, most coherent, most incoherent, the rudest, loudest, most self-aggrandizing, most self-scourging, most informative, the most static-filled white-noised days of my life. I'm canary, I'm weathervane, I'm Cassandra, I'm Fool. That you took the trouble to tell me this crappy blog sucks is a sign this crappy blog is suc(K)ceeding at some level. My thanks are not either/or either.

• Mehgahfeh. That felt good. That felt shitty.
• UPDATE! Fuck, I'm bypassed again.
• Poll!
• Hated.
• Liars, every one of them.
• It's not Left v Right, it's You v Corporations.
• Welfare.
• More thoughts on the thought police.
• Education as indoctrination.
• Obama's hit squad.
• God's left hand.
• It's official!
• UPDATE! Bye, Rahm, and fuck you too.
• Stone walls and steel bars.
• Holyfuck.
• UPDATE! Holyfuck, part two.
• See you in hell.
• UPDATE! Marketing and capitalism. 
• White America has lost its mind?
• Company men.
• It's this simple.
• My job's best perk:

• What do we tip waiters for?
• Ambulance-fee back on ballot. If anyone blegs a passionate post detailing the reasons to vote against the fee, I'll link. Alternatively, if that person wants to find his passionate comment detailing the reasons to vote against the fee downblog, I'll link to that.
• Good luck w/that, Gaithersburg.
• Marylanders want gambling.
• Weirdest weather year of my life.
• Asshole endorses asshole.
• Size-driven rivalry.
• Allsopp 2011?

• Gahfehmeh.
• What are books good for? "My best answer is that books produce knowledge by encasing it. Books take ideas and set them down, transforming them through the limitations of space into thinking usable by others. In 1959, C.P. Snow threw down the challenge of "two cultures," the scientific and the humanistic, pursuing their separate, unconnected lives within developed societies. In the new-media ecology of the 21st century, we may not have closed that gap, but the two cultures of the contemporary world are the culture of data and the culture of narrative. Narrative is rarely collective. It isn't infinitely expandable. Narrative has a shape and a temporality, and it ends, just as our lives do. Books tell stories. Scholarly books tell scholarly stories."
• Against the Day. I've found myself thinking about it more than I thought I would when I finished my second read a couple of months ago, mostly about Cyprian Latewood, his entire story but especially his epiphany in Bulgaria. The more I think about it, for all the Vibes, Traverses, Rideouts, Chums, and Highcourts, Cyprian may be the key character.
• UPDATE! Heh! Damn, now Jim's pissed at the realities of the world. Those of you guitar players who read this shitty blog, can The Situation's CD release be far away?
• Lit links.
• New Carl Dennis!
• Buggles.
  
• That'll do for lunch.
• Beyond Fitz and the Tantrums, the youngsters are listening to Frankie Rose and the Outs. Again, it's perfectly fine listening, but new rock going retro, not forward.
• Guilty pleasure.
• I would have bet Feist would be famous by now.
• UPDATE! Ear-candy!
• Guilty pleasure.
• Woke up with this in my head, my favorite REM song.
• Which has since been replaced by this guilty pleasure.
• UPDATE! Yay! Now this is in my head.

A MAXIM

Carl Dennis

To live each day as if it might be the last
Is an injunction that Marcus Aurelius
Inscribes in his journal to remind himself
That he, too, however privileged, is mortal,
That whatever bounty is destined to reach him
Has reached him already, many times.
But if you take his maxim too literally
And devote your mornings to tinkering with your will,
Your afternoons and evenings to saying farewell
To friends and family, you’ll come to regret it.
Soon your lawyer won’t fit you into his schedule.
Soon your dear ones will hide in a closet
When they hear your heavy step on the porch.
And then your house will slide into disrepair.
If this is my last day, you’ll say to yourself,
Why waste time sealing drafts in the window frames
Or cleaning gutters or patching the driveway?
If you don’t want your heirs to curse the day
You first opened Marcus’s journals,
Take him simply to mean you should find an hour
Each day to pay a debt or forgive one,
Or write a letter of thanks or apology.
No shame in leaving behind some evidence
You were hoping to live beyond the moment.
No shame in a ticket to a concert seven months off,
Or, better yet, two tickets, as if you were hoping
To meet by then someone who’d love to join you,
Two seats near the front so you catch each note.