it wasn't that
we were so high
we might have
fallen and hurt our
limbs or broken
our skin

but that we could see
just far enough
below us

those skeletons
of former life, still
moving bodies
and debris

that moaned and ached
in a world of their own,

(dully glowing
with experience and potential
beyond us)

wet on the ground,
decaying into
another soft branch of
life that we will never
fully know
or walk upon

but see, again and again, as
we end, seem content
with the distances we create
and those to which
we are not blind

(but also cannot help but
fall behind--
or into,
if we could only find the time)