He finds the whole thing
The people there were
Even the weird, patterned carpet looked
A certain feeling filled that space that was simply
What the old man mumbled in his sleep was
The Filipino lady suffering over a hangnail smelled
When a meth head sits next to him how can it not be even more
Watching him pick at his skin was worse than
Being in the library in the mall is
on a good day, in a good neighborhood, but can be particularly
when all around him is one after another reminder of just how
everywhere can be once he’s started to see everything as
He really didn’t intend this poem to be so
But lately he’s been finding more and more things hopelessly
Almost everything now strikes him as at least a little
To the point that the few friends he has left finally just told him they find him
Well, isn’t that
Philip Athans is the best-selling author of Annihilation and more than a dozen other fantasy and horror books, including The Guide to Writing Fantasy & Science Fiction and Writing Monsters. His blog, Fantasy Author’s Handbook (fantasyhandbook.wordpress.com), is updated every Tuesday, and you can follow him on Twitter @PhilAthans. He is the founding partner of Athans & Associates Creative Consulting, and lives in the foothills of the Washington Cascades, east of Seattle.