We Don't Just Vanish

Today, crossing Sunset on foot, I could have sworn I heard the bus that had pulled over before the crosswalk say "Central Park," then after I had crossed, a man speaking German fell in behind me, sounding atmospheric going up the hill, before he got in some car or another and left.

My friend is still dead, as it turns out, these things don't change, if alive in spirit as I believe. I don't know why I go months not thinking about this grueling fact only for it to come flying up at me with such intensity I wonder how it ever left. I also have living friends who have now given up, I think we're old enough to admit that, though we're not old, out loud at this time.

I would stay in this decade of life forever if I could and yet as autumn emerges feel eerie having surpassed the life spans of certain friends I didn't even know could die, like on some micro level, somewhere in my psyche, I depended on them being alive and even if I didn't, their life force was strong enough to preclude dying as a concept applying to them. I really hope, whatever is true, we don't just vanish.