from a height

What vantage but depth? Barefoot,

You took your place at the balcony edge

and looked out: the dewed city slept;

no cars crept on streets, no pedestrians

walked. Leveraged at forty feet up,

You saw a past that pushed you to this precipice.

O melodrama of drop:

one terminal love and sundry damages

demand an unwitnessed descent,

a pure y-axis plummet with an end

that meant love could be retired,

shed like clothing, unkept.    You waited,

planning pain’s abandonment,

and stared over blank building-tops. Below sat

a welcome mat of pavement.

Determined, erect,

You stole a glance back

inside the apartment.

There 

was your wife, her drowsy mouth

widening to the open O of witness

She rushed     despair

You stepped

towards futures

of impacted asphalt;

You leapt