our conversations are measured in graduated cylinders,
placed like ice cubes at my neck, you tell me
“no one knows this, but it's coming out like a new illness.”

the way you blink like headlights,
how your veins are green under standard fluorescent lighting,
that you sleep like all your rigid organs are on fire
is now available at every drug store, recommended for certain age groups,
everyone will be over you in two weeks' time.

you sit proud like the father of modern medicine,
oblivious to side-effects and infant death rates,
you have nothing to say to justify your actions
but you take them anyway.

and it has come to my attention that i am
breathtakingly wrong for the role of
intervention leader,

no one can stop your pamphlets from
going out in tuesday's mail.

let's just accept that this relationship is over.