My Vanished Friend

After another season
of Thurdays
composed of nine-ball
and mere drinking,
of a sudden,
Rory became blunt vernacular
wielded weird and wild as
a road rage tire iron
appropos of whatshisname’s
or suchawho’s mere existence.

The pool hall population
Dwindled and the owner
Asked questions to
which I’d no answers.

Even beforehand
what might have
naively passed for charm
was ‘bout as sweet
as an oily puddle.
A deceptive bit of rainbow
on the surface-

immediately underneath
was ultimately unctuous,
terrifically toxic.

Something'd come unglued in him,
and what was once merely unsusual,
occasionally interesting observation
careened through mania
toward the paranoic.

" I tell you
I’m singled out,
surveilled by hawks
along the highway!

My sleep’s a harbor for
the clash of talons,
the screech and clatter
of screaming eagles.

In the end,
practicality’s merely ballast, buddy.

I can feel
what I once referred to
as my Self
receding-

and it ain’t coming back.”

I must have looked worried,
for he reassured me
as he clambered
onto his woefully maintained,
once exquisite, Colnago-

“ Don’t worry,
Dulcinea’s drawing near.
My compass points
to hypoxic heights.”