Twenty-five percent
effort.
Twenty-five times a coin flipped
heads, heads, tails, tails.
Twenty-five years old
in the autocratic system,
twenty-five hundred stolen dollars
from a retirement plan,
social number xxx-12-2525.
Five times itself (because I couldn't resist).
Twenty-five years later,
no one will remember me,
the No One.
I'll be in the ocean,
on a mountain,
in the trunk,
maybe in the ground
or the air.
When I'm 25-
you might have a child.
It could be mine.
When I'm 25-
is the question's end, dear,
and I hope it ends
when I can't do anything more,
when my best is flat,
and I promise, my love,
that if my best is not best for you,
then I will leave you.
But if you feel yourself
destined for me,
if every time you wish change in the world
I'm putting my sneakers on,
pull yourself together
or better yet, fall apart
and float to me.
I can't expect the future,
and it's all I think about controlling.
Tonight, I'll stay with you,
in my arms and forget
nothing lasts.
