Though you think it can’t it does

sneak up on you

while you’re reading or making love.

Breathing through a mask,

mere craftsman,

not even co-star,

it slices you

from your next move

and creeps off.

Then you wait, lost,

not seeing yourself, anything,

as you did, till your orders arrive.

You’ll start at the bottom,

of course, an extra, propless

but for a few bad memories.

Perhaps you’ll render

your relatives’ lives miserable,

upending things without conviction,

without ambition, at first;

or the young couple in the old house,

perhaps teaching them a lesson,

moaning outside the door

with a restlessness

you’ll never outgrow.

---

Jeffrey Thompson was raised in Fargo, North Dakota, and educated at the University of Iowa and Cornell Law School. He lives in Phoenix, where he practices public interest law. His work has appeared in North Dakota Quarterly, On the Seawall, The Tusculum Review, ONE ART, New World Writing Quarterly, Hole in the Head Review, Main Street Rag, and Action, Spectacle. His hobbies include reading, hiking, and photography.