Matthew Buckley Smith

The place we lived was only an idea, Nothing to do with the failed cotton mill town Where a record shop, some bars, and a pizzeria Were all we ever cared to call our own. From nightmares of a happy life with kids We'd wake in boozy sweat to find the floor Still cobbled with bottle caps and take-out lids, Our twenties crumpled safely in a drawer, Unspent like all the hours ahead that night We met each other in the common room And found somehow without the help of light Our way across the river by the time Dawn spilled down from the campus to the banks We'd come to, single, sobered-up again, To see the morning glories give their thanks For things we had, and hardly noticed, then.