Dirty Joe
This is for you
wallowing through the streets 
when I was strung out
and you were too
we collapsed together
in the halfway house
clutching some mad dream
thought it would never end 
and we’d be clutching through eternity
now you're dead
I’ve got a bum hip
lingering covid
and a dead-end job
the halfway house
boarded up

This is me 7:49am
Tuesday morning
Broadway 
twenty-four degrees 
holding on to the railing
of twenty years ago 
afraid I'll slip and fall
into the who I am now