What I’m Thinking | John Grey

Friend

when I think of your wrist scars,

and your little vices

like excessive drinking

and addiction to opioids,

and how single-mindedly 

you dig your own grave

where the earth is softest,

where what’s left of your being

will so easily fit,

and how you manage

to shut yourself away

from the good in the world,

and swear by a logic

with more cracks

than an LA earthquake,

and how your smile

is now the grimace

that reveals the way

your eyes now reduce

everything they see to pain –

I never know

what I’m thinking.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review, Poetry Salzburg Review and Hollins Critic. Latest books, “Leaves On Pages” and “Memory Outside The Head” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Lana Turner and International Poetry Review.