Love thy neighbor

The older men on my street bend down to pick up cigarettes

that the younger men left there

They light the end of it and inhale deeply

from their life pipe

Exhaling smoke into the atmosphere

for all of us to see

A woman in the alleyway sits with her back against a garage door

Rummaging through her bag for something to eat

Maybe something to drink

She stands up from her ghostly post and looks at me

A younger man with his own life pipe

Refusing to let me walk in my lonesome

There is a mattress next to the road

Covered in holes and stains and stories

of cotton pillowed nights and cheap beer

It is no longer white

but a color that has not been invented yet

I do not love thy neighbor on many of these days

I am simply afraid.